


Extranormal Observation and Detainment Unit 5 (ExODU5)

by cagedchaos (leen_go)



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: M/M, Minor Character Death, Science Fiction, Slow Burn, Supernatural Law Enforcement, Unbeta-ed
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-10-14
Updated: 2018-03-01
Packaged: 2019-01-17 11:44:22
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 24,895
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12365046
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leen_go/pseuds/cagedchaos
Summary: [Discontinued] An undercover job to discover the identity of the resident king pin, Peter Pan, goes wrong and Kris Wu is left partnerless. His investigation gets taken over by an agency he hasn't even heard of before - ExODU5 and, determined to exact revenge for his fallen partner, he joins their ranks to uncover the truth.





	1. The New Guy

**Author's Note:**

> Jaysus, it's been literally over half a year since I last posted. Uhm, oops??? (There was actually a bunch of writing that I discarded, ulgh).  
> Anyway, I've been working on this for a bit now and I have most of it hashed out in terms of plot, so hopefully I won't be /too/ long in posting? I want to push myself to get a chapter up every two weeks or so, but I make no promises >.<  
> Heads up, there's actually a couple of tags that I'm omitting on purpose in case of spoilers but I'm /pretty/ sure none of them will ever be 'major character death'. I haven't committed to the degree of violence I'll actually describe in my scenes, but like... it's a spy fic, there will be some blood shed. I have an aversion to blood myself, so it shouldn't be too graphically described (I included it in the warnings just in case).  
> Comments will be loved and cherished! <3
> 
> SORRY ABOUT THE REALLY LONG A/N, HERE'S THE FIC.

Zhang Yixing’s gum snapped loudly in his ears as he skimmed through the file his manager sent him earlier that morning. _‘Fill yourself in on the new guy, Yixing, he’s coming with you on your next mission,’_ Director Amber Liu had instructed in an email, the personnel file attached to the message.

That was five hours ago and his team was supposed to be in a pre-job brief in Conference Room B in - Yixing checked his watch - fifteen minutes. He’d been too preoccupied with catching up on his late reports that he’d dismissed the file when he discovered that it was more than fifteen pages long, getting only a glimpse of the profile picture at the top of the document. He was only reminded of the file he was supposed to review when that same face showed up in the flesh, taking a seat at the desk across from his own.

Yixing cursed under his breath at his own lack of organisation, drawing a look of disdain from ExODU5’s newest recruit. Yixing cleared his throat, sitting up properly as he drew up the document he should’ve reviewed hours ago. He grabbed a handful of the jellybeans from the jar that sat at the corner of his desk and popped one in his mouth as the file opened onto his screen.

The corners of the agent pulled downwards into a frown as he analysed the stern gaze in the picture at the top of the file, wondering if this was his neutral look or if the man was perpetually sour about life in general. He glanced around his computer and decided that it was probably both. Kris Wu, as the file introduced, was glaring at the tablet in his hand, ExODU5 standard issue for all field agents (Yixing’s was in his drawer at the moment). Yixing scrolled down past the picture and continued to read the CV of the newest addition to his team.

Yixing had only started reading the section on Kris’ prior assignments (he was starting to wonder why Amber had decided to bring this man on board if there were _this_ many red flags on his record) when there was a loud clatter of tablet hitting desk. It was a familiar sound and Yixing couldn’t help the chuckle that escaped him when he recognized the look of frustration he often wore with technology refused to cooperate, especially when the tablets had first been rolled out. “Hey, you’re the new guy, right?” he greeted.  

The man looked up only briefly to acknowledge Yixing before returning to glaring daggers into his tablet, “Yeah, it’s Kris,” he corrected. “Is there something you want?” he asked, voice scratchy with irritation.

“You’re the guy who quit after his partner died,” Yixing stated flatly, recalling from the file the last case Kris had been assigned. He hadn’t meant any hostility by the comment; almost everyone at ExODU5 had to enact an exit plan from their original agency. The way Kris’ gaze darkened at the comment made Yixing wonder if he should’ve started their conversation on a different note.

Yixing cleared his throat and tried again, “You want any help with that tablet?” he offered, trying to keep his tone light, though it only seemed to annoy the tall male further. Kris groaned, rolling his eyes as he got to his feet, tablet in hand. He didn’t bother giving Yixing a second glance, looking around the office a moment before making for Conference Room B.

“There’s a fingerprint scanner in the bottom right corner!” Yixing called after Kris in an effort to help, though his only thanks was another groan and a increase in pace as the tall man stalked away.

“Doesn’t play well with others, huh?” Yixing muttered to himself, returning his focus back to his computer screen, “That’s an understatement.” He checked his watch again and cursed once more; the rest of the file would have to wait.

As Yixing pushed open the glass door, he found Kris in one of the chairs, poking at his tablet, clearly  with access to the ExODU5 database at long last. “Got it figured then, I see,” Yixing grinned, taking the empty seat next to Kris. “I’m Zhang Yixing,” he offered when he realised he hadn’t properly introduced himself yet, holding his hand out to shake.

Kris took one look at Yixing’s hand and then up at its owner before scowling and spinning away in his chair, making a point to ignore the attempt at camaraderie. Hardly offended, Yixing simply shrugged; he hardly expected more from what he’d read minutes ago. The room began to fill as several other agents trickled into the room and Yixing turned to greet them, sitting up straighter in his seat when the last of them entered, closing the door behind her.

“Alright, everyone, listen up,” Amber announced as she stepped into the room, not bothering to check if everyone who was needed was in attendance. “According to our sources, this item,” she paused, tapping on the surface of her own tablet to bring up an image on the large monitor at the head of the room before she continued, “Is in the possession of William Chan.”

“William Chan, as in the owner of the nightclub that launders money for Peter Pan?” Kim Jongdae piped up, his tone slightly bewildered. Peter Pan was the alias of the man behind the man behind the man behind the operation and even after years, agencies were still struggling to determine Peter Pan’s real identity and his true goals.

In his periphery, Yixing caught Kris rolling his eyes and he frowned. William Chan was long known by practically everyone in law enforcement and while ExODU5’s head of tech-ops had a habit of pointing out facts that everyone already knew, he was harmless and Kris’ holier-than-thou attitude left Yixing feeling annoyed.

“So what the hell are we looking at, exactly?” Yixing asked, prompting the conversation away from Jongdae as he gestured at the strange piece of unidentified technology on the screen.

“Looks like… a battery?” Jongdae offered, tilting his head as his eyes narrowed at the screen in analysis.

Amber shrugged, “Frankly, it’s anyone’s guess.”

“What is it supposed to power?” Jongdae continued to himself, clearly ignoring the director as he rolled forward in his chair and squinted at the device.

Amber finally settled into the seat at the head of the table, grumbling something inaudible as she brought up another image on the screen. “Kim Junmyeon,” Amber introduced, glancing briefly at Kris before continuing, “He was one of Chan’s inner circle before he shot himself in the head.”

Yixing raised an eyebrow in alarm, “Shot himself?” he repeated rhetorically as the monitor changed once more. Yixing cringed involuntarily at the sight of the same man, now lying on pavement with a crimson halo and unseeing eyes staring at something invisible.

“Local authorities had an undercover agent tasked with getting close enough to Kim to determine what this object was used for but unfortunately, before he could pass on anything he might’ve learned, Chan’s men put a bullet in him.

“The objective is simple,” Amber continued as blueprints came into view, “Find out what we can about where Chan is holding this device and any other information he might have on what it actually _is_. We don’t have much here so I want this op to be strictly recon.” Amber turned to address Yixing, “You’ll run point on this, I want a plan first thing tomorrow morning.”

She turned to address Kris next, “You have experience with the players so I want you running comms.” Kris opened his mouth as if to offer some sort of objection but Amber either didn’t see it or didn’t care to acknowledge him, turning to face the rest of the group again, “Jongdae, get together with Yixing and see what you can come up with for support. And I want the rest of you on back-up in case things go south. We lost a good man on this already and we can’t afford another.” Amber ordered before standing up, the monitor going black as she stood up and started for the door. “And Yixing, come see me in my office.”

Yixing nodded, taking a deep breath as he turned, ready to feign enthusiasm for working with Kris, but the latter was already out the door, chasing after the Director with a look of frustration mixed with determination. Yixing raised an intrigued eyebrow, getting up from his seat to follow the rest of the agents out of the room as he watched Kris make straight for Amber’s office. He wondered briefly if he should round back to his desk for a brief moment so as to give the two a couple more minutes to discuss whatever it was that required discussion. He settled on slowing his pace as he made his way to the director’s office.

Yixing could sense Kris’ agitation from where he paused on the other side of Amber’s frost door. The tall man’s silhouette was gesturing wildly and Yixing hesitated to announce his presence with a knock, not sure he wanted to interrupt the heated discussion inside.

As he raised his hand to rapt at the door, Amber’s voice called out through the glass, “Come in, Yixing,” Amber commanded, her voice crisp and making Yixing jump in surprise. He did as he was told, pushing the door open to a red-faced Kris standing with his arms crossed, clearly displeased with _something_. Yixing looked over to Amber, who didn’t look bothered in the least, back relaxed against her chair, fingers twiddling with a pen. “We’re done here, Wu,” she announced dismissively before gesturing for Yixing to take the seat in front her.

Yixing could almost hear the teeth grind in Kris’ mouth as he spun around to glare at Yixing, but he said nothing as he threw his arms down on each side dramatically. Yixing stepped aside, holding the the door open as the taller took his leave, his eyebrows stitched together. “You’re welcome,” Yixing grumbled under his breath derisively as he let go of the door and moved towards Amber’s desk as instructed. “You wanted to see me, Director?” he asked, raising an eyebrow in mild interest at the way Amber stared at her closed office door long after Kris had left.

“I want you to keep an eye out on that one,” Amber finally said, pulling herself towards forwards in her chair so she could rest her elbows on the desk.

“Kris, you mean?”

“Yes, did you read the file I sent you?”

Yixing made a gesture of something between a nod and a shrug. “I haven’t finished, but given how many red flags I came across in the first pages I _did_ read, I have to ask, why him, Amber?” he answered, dropping the formalities; Yixing and Amber had started together as partners after all. “I’m not sure why you want an agent with such a messy file on the team. Doesn’t ExODU5, you know, have higher expectations or something?”

A smile tugged at the corners of Amber’s lips, as if expecting Yixing’s doubts, “That’s exactly what I need to talk to you about. There’s something I left out of the file I sent you.” She dropped the pen she was fiddling with and looked Yixing dead in the eye. “Kris didn’t get here the same way as all the agents. There was no recommendation by his superiors and like you said, he doesn’t exactly fit the typical profile we are looking for in our agents,” Amber paused for a moment, “He’s here because he and I have made a kind of agreement.”

Yixing balked, “What? What kind of agreement?”

“That undercover agent I mentioned in the briefing meeting? It was Kris’ partner. When they assigned me to pick up the case from the local police, Kris all but begged me not to take his case away. Technically, Kris is here on a revenge mission - he was on scene when his partner died.”

“Wh-…?” Yixing started to ask before slamming his mouth shut when he realised that Amber hadn’t finished; personal vendettas were not allowed and agents were removed from the case when they had _any_ personal tie to the investigation. If Amber was letting the Kris on her team, she must have her reasons.

“The sniper went through Kris’ shoulder to take out his partner but left him alive and I want to know why. I told him I was letting him on the team because his input might be valuable, since he’d been dealing with _whatever it is that we’re dealing with_ for half a year longer than anyone else here. I haven’t dismissed the possibility that he’s alive because he’s one of _theirs_ . I have to know either way. I don’t trust him, at least not yet. But I trust _you_ , so I want you to make sure he stays in line and you report anything suspicious directly to me.”

Yixing stared back, wondering why Amber would take this risk. What was there about this case that she wasn’t sharing that would make her risk everyone at ExODU5? This was a division based on _extranormal_ operations, and there was something Amber wasn’t sharing. She continued to look at Yixing expectantly and he hesitated a moment before he nodded to acknowledge her request.

“Yeah, whatever you need,” Yixing replied.

Amber smiled as though with relief before she turned to her computer screen, signalling the end of their conversation.

...

"Radio check, one, two, three," Yixing articulated slowly from his seat adjacent to Kris in the cramped van.

"You're loud and clear," Kris shot back before booting up the diagnostics screen on his laptop. "You ready?" he asked, eliciting a roll of the eyes from Yixing before the latter turned to the small mirror on the other side of him, reaching up into his hair to run his fingers through it and pulling the strands into a haphazard mess. Satisfied with the unkempt mop on his head, he turned to Kris with a grin, "How do I look?" He watched expectantly as Kris eyed his wrinkled button up shirt, half tucked into a pair of cheaply made pants, sleeves bunched up at his elbows.

“Like you hate the downtown office job that just fired you and have unreasonable expectations of finding a good one night stand that you're not going to regret in the morning," Kris summarized with a scowl.

Yixing's lips pulled further up into his cheeks, creasing his eyes into half moons. He fiddled with the glasses on his nose so that they sat crookedly on his face. "Excellent, then I guess the answer to your question is 'yes, I _am_ ready'," he replied cheerfully, ducking his head as he got to his feet and opened the van's back door to step out.

"Oh, hey, don't forget this," Kris called, tossing Yixing a bottle when the latter turned around.

Yixing caught the bottle in one hand, turning it so that he could read the label. "Really?" he muttered, shaking his head, "They couldn't afford anything better than _Smirnoff_? This shit's disgusting," he groaned as he unscrewed the cap, grimacing when his nose caught wind of its odor.

"Yes, but if fits your cover," Kris explained unnecessarily.

Yixing rolled his eyes as he forced back a gulp of the cheap vodka before emptying a healthy amount of the bottle's contents over himself and the rest into the grass beside him. "Right," Yixing slurred, adding a small stumble for effect as he closed the van door and headed down the sidewalk towards _Lady Luck_.

As Yixing neared the nightclub's entrance, he started to exaggerate his stumbles, grabbing onto the brick wall of the building for mock support before grinning up at the bouncer who stood with his arms crossed in front of the door, clearly unamused.

"Hey," he greeted lazily, bringing up the empty bottle to eye level, "Care to let me in for a refill?" he asked, letting his thick-rimmed glasses slide down his nose crookedly.

The man didn't bother to give Yixing a reply, his attention paid to the long line-up of customers whining to get inside.

Yixing fumbled for the wallet in his pocket, tripping over himself before he managed to pull out a couple hundred dollar bills and waving them in front of the bouncer. "C'mon, man, I just need a top up. I'll be in and out in like a minute," he reasoned. When he received a derisive roll of the eyes, he dipped into his wallet once more and pulled out two more to join the first two.

The man eyed the bills with slightly more interest, sighing for a moment before he finally acknowledged Yixing's efforts. "Just be quick, alright?"

"You," Yixing started, shoving the wallet clumsily back into his back pocket with one hand and pointing at the bouncer with the hand holding the bottle, "Are a great and generous man, bless your soul, man." Yixing grinned, stumbling forward after giving the nightclub's proverbial guard dog a pat on the back.

"Well, that wasn't too hard," he muttered under his breath so that only Kris could hear as he stepped through the door into the dimly lit club, ears immediately assaulted with loud music, chest pounding in rhythm with the bass.

"Don't get cocky," came the curt response from the voice in his ear.

Keeping up his act as a drunk nobody, he half stumbled through the crowd towards the back of the building, smiling at a girl who seemed to be having more trouble standing in one spot than his fake identity did. Declining her not-so-subtle offer to dance, he made his way to the bathrooms, keeping an eye out for anyone suspicious in the low lighting. Side stepping out of the way of someone climbing up the stairs out of the bathrooms before descending the steps himself.

Taking another careful glance around him as he neared his destination, he detoured from the bathroom door and headed further along the corridor towards a door marked with an 'Authorized Personnel Only' sign. When tugging on the handle unsurprisingly revealed that it was locked, Yixing reached into his pocket and pulled out his wallet, flipping aside the compartments for cards to reach the hidden lock-pick set. He pulled a couple of the tools out and slipped them between his lips as he dropped to one knee in front of the door handle, setting his empty bottle down beside him. With the music upstairs now a dull throbbing through the floor, he focused on the door handle, eyebrows furrowing together in concentration before the door unlocked with a soft click.

Tucking his tools back into his pocket and picking up his bottle once more, he glanced around him a last time to make sure he wasn't being watched before grabbing the handle and pushing the door inwards. "I'm in," he whispered into the empty room as he closed and locked the door once more, "I'll let you know what I find."

"Copy that," Kris replied.

"Anything look familiar?" Yixing asked, straightening the glasses on his nose as he scanned the area around him.

"Not yet, but it looks like there's a junction box just ahead."

Yixing rolled his eyes at the obvious next step but didn't say anything as he stepped towards the mentioned panel, open the metal door to an array of switches. He chewed on his bottom lip as he skimmed through the labels wrapped around the cables before finding several marked 'cam' followed by a series of numbers from one to sixteen. "Well, this better work, Sparkplug," he grumbled out loud to himself as he reached into his pocket once more and pulled out a small case Jongdae had given him, opening the lid to reveal the contraption inside. One of the overhead lights flickered, making Yixing look up abruptly before continuing. "All that money and Mr. Chan can't get someone to fix his lights," he mumbled jokingly as he grabbed the cables and stripped them one by one with a pair of handheld pliers before attaching the device across all of them. "How're we looking, Qinglong?"

"I've got eyes," Kris confirmed, prompting Yixing to close the panel once more. "I'll loop the feed so you can move freely. The next hallway looks clear but it looks like there's another door up ahead, and it’s not on any of the blueprints."

"What is it with bad guys and ridiculously long corridors in their evil lairs?" Yixing asked rhetorically, shaking his head as he hurried along the hallway even though he knew Kris couldn't see.

"Quit yapping and stay focused, Kirin," Kris berated over the ear piece, his tone no-nonsense.

Yixing pulled his fake glasses off and turned them around so that he could glare into the camera for a moment, knowing that it’d annoy Kris even more. "Need a keycard to get in," Yixing announced, replacing his glasses so he could show Kris the scanner next to the locked door.

“Get around it then,” Kris prompted unhelpfully.

Yixing rolled his eyes, “When we get back, we’re going to have a talk about your shitty attitude,” he berated, reaching his hand into his pocket to retrieve his lock-pick set. He slid out one tool at random, flipping it around to the use back to pry open the back of the scanner until it came loose off the wall, now hanging from a mess of cable. "Black to red," he mumbled to himself as he  pulled wires from their housing.

“There isn’t a camera behind that door so I’m blind if you go in there.”

“Sounds like the right place, then” Yixing chirped in response as the light on the scanner turned from red to green with a soft ‘beep’. Remounting the plastic casing onto the wall, Yixing took a deep breath and pushed the door open, breathing out with relief when the room was empty. Closing the door quietly behind him, he took a quick survey of the small office: there was a mahogany desk with a low back sitting at the other end of the room, an expensive looking painting hung to the left and a fully stocked liquor cart to the right. "Looks like we might have a winner," Yixing hummed as he hurried towards the desk and flipped through the pages scattered across its surface. When nothing suspicious turned up, he rummaged through the drawers.

"Wait, the bottom drawer is locked," he said out loud, hardly expecting an answer as he settled to his knees to get to work with his lock-pick set once more. The unlocked drawer opened to more files and Yixing cursed out loud; who kept so much paper around anymore? It was the twenty-first century, for crying out loud.

"Shit, Chan's coming down the hallway," Kris warned, only the slightest hint of urgency in his voice, "Did you find what we need?"

' _Does it look like I found what we need? You can see everything I see._ ' Yixing wanted to hiss but settled with a disgruntled 'no' instead as he slid the drawer closed and crawled under the desk, glad that the back of the desk might just be low enough to hide him if Chan didn't decide he needed to take a seat. Groaning at the cramped space, he pulled the empty bottle towards him. He unscrewed the cap carefully, flipping the lid over so that he could extract the thin disc fitted inside just as a soft 'beep' sounded from the other side of the office door.

Keeping his cursing inside his head, he squeezed his eyes shut for a brief moment to refocus as footsteps echoed in the room. Yixing looked around quickly, picking the right-most corner of the desk underside to attach the bug he'd extracted from his liquor bottle.

"Alright, bug's hot, now get out of there," Kris confirmed in his ear. The footsteps on the other side of the desk stopped, making Yixing freeze in the middle of repositioning himself into something more favourable. He turned around and brought a finger to the button on the side of his glasses, changing the embedded camera to backscatter mode and waiting.

"Wait, what is he doing?" Kris' voice sounded in his ear alongside a series of soft beeps; a code? But to what? There was a pause on the line, as if Kris was waiting for a response from Yixing before realising that the latter couldn't see what the camera in his glasses was currently picking up. "Looks like there's a safe behind that painting," Kris supplied eventually. "I can't see clearly what he's doing, but we need to get a look inside once you get clear."

Yixing sighed inwardly, ' _Why is there always a safe behind the painting?'_ he asked himself in exasperation as he moved  into a slightly less uncomfortable crouch, feeling somewhat silly staring at the back of desk as he waited for Kris' next instruction.

"Alright, he's leaving now," Kris announced. Yixing waited for the sound of the door closing before shuffling backwards and crawling out from under the desk, hitting the button on his glasses again to change the camera setting back to regular display once more. He hurried towards the painting, fingers immediately moving to trace the edge of the frame.

"It swings open to the right," Kris supplied just as Yixing felt a small lever hidden behind frame with his left index finger.

"Got it," Yixing announced as he triggered the latch, holding onto the frame and pulling it open with his right hand as he hit a second button on his glasses to switch the camera mode to infrared. "What do we have?" he prompted as he waited for his partner to scan the residual heat traces on the pin pad.

"Try 1-2-7-9-4-8-3," Kris instructed after a brief moment.

"Code's good," Yixing confirmed, turning the handle on the safe to open it. "What am I looking for?" he asked, momentarily forgetting that Kris had said a minute ago that he couldn't see what Chan was doing from under the desk. "Nevermind," he muttered as he started to flip through the articles in the safe: several bundles of different currencies, a 9mm glock, a stack of passports and a small metal case. A  tattered looking leather bag the size of a small suitcase rested at the bottom of the pile, looking slightly out of place with the modern minimalist design of the room. "What do we have here?" he asked out loud rhetorically as he reached for it, carefully displacing the items on top of it.

The leather case was heavier than he’d expected, and he had set it on the desk before attempting to open the clasp on the front. “You seeing this? Who the hell still uses _paper_ these days?” he remarked when he pulled out a stack of pages, heavier than standard paper. The sheets felt brittle between his fingers and by the beige tinge, he guessed they were decades, in not _centuries_ old. Each page was littered by hand-drawn diagrams, surrounded by strange symbols of a language that Yixing didn’t recognize. “What language is this in?!” Yixing asked out loud as he sifted through the pages slowly, making sure to go slow enough for the camera in his glasses to capture each clearly.

“None that I’ve ever seen,” Kris replied, awe evident in his voice.

Silence fell in the room and in Yixing’s earpiece as he flipped through each page, counting up to a hundred and three before Kris’ panicked voice rang in his ear, “Shit, get out of there, Kirin. I lost all cams, someone knows we’re here.”

“Is it Chan?” Yixing hissed in reply, hesitating for a brief moment before looking back down to flip through the rest of the pages.

“I...I’m not sure, the jamming signal is… the signature’s weird, and it doesn’t look like anything I’ve seen before.”

Yixing cursed, hurriedly stacking the pages together once he reached the end of the pile (a hundred and seventeen total pages) and slipping them back into the leather holding case.  He replaced it back into the safe, taking care to replace each item as he’d originally found it save for the gun; he’d come into the club unarmed in case he was searched at the door but he was going to need the firearm if someone was coming after him, even if there weren’t any spare magazines. ‘ _Who keeps a gun in their safe without spare bullets,’_ he scowled, shoving the barrel of the gun into the back of his pants before grabbing the safe door and closing it.

Just as the painting swung closed, there was a rattle at the door, the handle visibly jiggling as whoever on the other side struggled with the lock. Instinctively, Yixing reached behind him for his newly acquired weapon and trained it on the entrance. “Anything yet, Qinglong?”

There was only static for a reply and Yixing cursed again; whoever had cut off Kris’ access to their cameras had cut off their communication too. “Great,” he muttered to himself as he moved himself towards the door, stepping to the hinge side of the door and tucking his gun away in the back of his pants again as he waited. Given how long it was taking the person on the other side to get the door open, he could safely assume it wasn’t any of Chan’s men, but who was this third party?

Yixing didn’t have time to contemplate the issue further as the the door unlocked with a soft click. He breathed slow door opened, a pointed gun first to enter Yixing’s line of sight. He waited until the hand holding it up crept into view and in a swift move, he stepped out from behind the door, grabbing the unknown person’s wrist and forcing the gun out of their hand and sending it clattering harmlessly to the floor. He had to block a hook to his left side with his free arm, but he misread his opponent’s next move, taking a foot to his stomach that knocked the wind out of him, forcing him a couple steps back towards the center of the office.

“Who the hell are you?!” Yixing demanded as he steadied himself in the moment before he had to block a front kick with both hands. A glimpse of his attacker revealed a tall man, hair done up like he was out for a good night (fitting, given that they were in a nightclub). Yixing was forced to take another step backwards, ducking as the intruder aimed for his head with a reverse roundhouse. “Not a talker, then, I take it,” Yixing remarked, trying not to let it show too obviously that he was feeling more pressure than he’d expected. He blocked another punch, reaching behind him for the bottle he’d left on the deck and bringing it down on his assailant's head with a loud shatter making the man stagger back a couple steps, a stream of red flowing down his face as he parried Yixing’s attacks.

The man finally spoke as he threw Yixing over his shoulder, the latter landing painfully on his back with a low groan as his glasses flew off, clattering on the floor somewhere to his left. “You’re not bad,” he observed in a flat tone as Yixing rolled over onto his side so he could pick himself back up. “Too bad you’re just too slow, and a little careless at that.”

The sound of an unlatching safety made Yixing freeze, and he turned his head slowly to find himself staring down the wrong end of the barrel. He cursed when he realised that it was the one he’d shoved into the back of his pants earlier; his attacker’s gun was still lying by the door.

“Fortunately for you,” the man continued, side stepping towards the painting on the wall while still holding the gun trained at Yixing’s head, “This is a no-kill job. I’m just here for the information,” he explained, barely looking away from Yixing to the keypad as he input the same combination Yixing had used only moments ago. He tucked the leather case under his arm easily before stepping backwards towards the exit, bending down to pick up the other gun. “ _Un_ fortunately, I can’t have you chasing after me.”

The bullet pierced through Yixing’s left thigh a split second after the loud ‘ _bang’_ and Yixing bit his tongue as his whine echoed in the small room. He instinctively reached for his leg, covering the entrance wound with the palm of his hand and he tried to refocus his paid elsewhere.

“Well, if they weren’t looking for you before, they are now,” the man chuckled, releasing the magazine to check the number of bullets left. “Looks like you’ve still got enough to get out of here alive,” the man sniggered, replacing the magazine before tossing it down on the ground beside Yixing. He turned to leave, hesitating after a step before turning back to face Yixing. “Oh, and tell Kris Wu that he says ‘hello’,” he said with a small smile, emphasising the ‘he’ as if it was an important name.

Refusing to betray any confusion at the greeting, Yixing narrowed his eyes, lips pressed together as he watched the man leave. When the door closed once more, Yixing pulled himself up on one knee, taking a deep breath before getting up to both his feet, hopping on his good leg a couple times before putting pressure on his wounded one. He hissed as a sharp pain shot up from the wound and he limped towards the desk, fumbling for the scissors standing in the pen holder.

Yixing was in the middle of pulling his shirt over his head when a crackle of static sounded in his ear followed by a loud feedback tone made him flinch. “You there, Kirin?” Kris asked several times, his voice getting clearer the longer he spoke.

“Yeah, what the hell took so long?” Yixing growled in response, cutting a long strip from his shirt before wrapping it several times around his leg and tying off the wound.

“You’ve got three men headed your way, better get moving,” Kris warned, ignoring the question. Yixing didn’t bother asking how or when his partner had access to the cameras again, somewhat glad that Kris had cut straight to the point.

“Find me a way out of here, Qinglong,” Yixing ordered with urgency, tossing the unused portion of his shirt to the side and the bloodstained scissors back into its holder with a clatter; there was no point covering up, Chan already knew he was here.

“Take a left when you open the door.”

Yixing took a deep breath before he moved, picking up his fallen glasses before grabbing the gun the strange man had left behind and leaving the office.

“Two coming down the corridor. Two more right behind them”

Yixing pressed his back against the wall hurriedly, waiting for the footsteps around the corner to pound close enough for him to grab the first one and use his momentum to fall him before kicking a foot out to trip the second man. Without a moment’s hesitation, he jumped over the struggling pile with his gun held high, firing at the incoming hostiles until they fell to the ground with grunts. He raced towards the end of the hallway, crashing into the door there before finding the handle.

“Take the third door on your right. Exit’s at the end of the hall there, but there are two guards covering the exit on the outside. I’ll meet you there with the van.”

His legs moved as fast as he could get them, limping as he ran with adrenaline coursing through his veins. When he finally reached the exit Kris mentioned, he slowed down to catch his breath. He dropped to a cautious stalk as he reached for the handle. Just then, he heard the sound of two silenced gunshots on the other side of the metal door, followed by the thuds of the same number bodies falling to the ground. Furrowing his brow in suspicion, he pulled his hand away from the handle and checked the magazine, though he already knew he only had two bullets left. Hoping fervently that it was Kris on the other side of that door, he took a deep breath and pushed it open the the brisk night, firearm held at the ready.

“The hell took you so long?” Kris grumbled from the driver side of their van, his gaze dropping to the makeshift bandage around Yixing’s leg. “Just get in,” he growled before reaching over to open the passenger side door.

“Thanks,” Yixing managed to mumble before limping around the vehicle and climbing in, slamming the door as Kris’ foot hit the accelerator.

As they pulled onto the main road, Yixing waited until Kris confirmed that they were in the clear, that no one was following them, before unbuckling his seatbelt and hobbling into the back of the van.

“You alright?” Kris asked without turning around.

Yixing grunted in response, “Yeah, some asshole shot me in the leg.” He started to explain, grabbing a tablet out of one of the overhead cabinets before settling into one of the chairs bolted into the van’s flooring. Retrieving the glasses in his pocket, he connected the device’s back-up memory into the tablet with a cable, undoing the bandage around his leg as he waited for the data to transfer. “No idea who it was, but he seemed to know you.”

There was a long pause in the van before Kris replied, his tone uneasy, “Who?”

Yixing glanced up, meeting Kris’ reflected gaze in the rearview mirror and shaking his head, “No idea, he didn’t leave a name, but I’m pretty sure the camera got a good look at him before he so graciously knocked my glasses off.” He turned away from the tablet to reach into one of the drawers to his left, pulling out a first aid kit to attend to the bullet hole in his thigh. “I suppose he _was_ kind enough to miss my femoral artery,” he mused out loud as he grabbed the pair of forceps from the kit and poured a healthy amount of rubbing alcohol on it. “Didn’t hit any bone either,” he grumbled, surprised at the impressed tone of his own voice even as he pushed the flesh aside to investigate his wound with a hiss. He pulled out the bullet with relative ease, using a fresh dressing to soak up the new flow of blood and holding it in place. He glanced back to his tablet, glad the download was complete and the file had been converted. He emptied a painkillers into his hand before replacing the whole bottle into the first aid kit, swallowing them dry before half-tidying his mess; he could clean up later, right now he wanted to discuss his mysterious attacker and figure out why he knew Kris’ name.

“Here, take a look,” Yixing said before making his way back to the front of the van with the tablet. He opened the video file and skipped ahead to nearly the end, pausing the video on an image of Yixing’s attacker before settling into the passenger seat. He scowled at the annoyingly perfectly groomed hair, combed up and away from his face, eyes dark with malice and framed with thick eyebrows as he stared down his pointed nose at the camera with lips curled into a mocking sneer. “He was fast, almost _unnaturally_ fast.”

Yixing turned the tablet screen towards Kris, waiting for the latter to glance over when they stopped at a red light. “Know him?” Yixing prompted when Kris’ recognition took the form of a furrowed brow and darkened eyes.

“Yeah,” Kris replied flatly as his eyes returned to the road in front of him, “I know him, alright.”

Yixing waited for further explanation and when none came, his eyebrow raised into his forehead as he pressed for more information, turning the tablet back to himself. “Okay, well, does he have a name?”

There was another long pause before Kris sighed, “The last time I saw him, he was calling himself Huang Zitao.”

“Any idea who he’s working for?” Yixing asked, head down as he tried to search for the name ‘Huang Zitao’ in the  ExODU5 mobile database.

“He’s freelance,” Kris began, “Works for the highest bidder, doesn’t care what the job is as long as he gets paid. I have no idea who that might be right now. And you’d have to dig pretty deep to find anything on him,” he added when he noticed the frown on Yixing’s face when the database came up empty.

“Well, we’ve got some pretty good analysts back at HQ,” Yixing piped up optimistically as he switched the tablet off. He’d never been good at the research part of his job; he was more of the hands-on type and he wasn’t even sure he’d gotten the characters correct when he wrote in the name in the search.

Kris only hummed in response, a silence falling in the vehicle once more. It was a long moment before he spoke up again, “How did you know we knew each other?”

“Oh, right. Uh, he said something about someone saying ‘hi’ to you,” Yixing recalled, tossing the tablet into the van’s glove compartment. “I believe his exact words were ‘tell Kris Wu that he says ‘hello’. Whoever ‘ _he’_ is, this Huang Zitao guy made it sound like he was important and that you’d know him.”

“Nope, I got nothin’,” Kris supplied with a shrug, unhelpfully.

Yixing sighed with disappointment as he rest his head back, painkillers kicking in as he buckled himself into the seat. “Wake me up when we get back to HQ, okay?”


	2. Only One Rule

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The ExODU5 team is sent in to finally recover the device they've been looking for, but things don't go quite as planned.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had to change Chanyeol's character so I'm sorry if it throws anyone off >.< He wasn't really talked about in the first chapter so it shouldn't screw things up too much. I'm running off 3 hours of sleep in the last two days so please forgive any typos or anything that's just grossly wrong. I'm posting now though cus I have a flight to catch and I'll be hosting a friend for a few days, so I'll be pretty busy...  
> Anyway, have fun with the chapter!

“Hey, how’s analysis going?” Yixing asked with his mouth full. He held his half-eaten pineapple bun in one hand and a cup of coffee in the other as he took a step into what Jongdae liked to call his office. In actuality, it was just the northwest corner of the ExODU5 lab, a cluttered mess of wires and unrecognizable and incomplete toys with blinking lights. Yixing stepped carefully around a mound of sweaters, making sure the coffee didn’t spill over. 

Jongdae jumped in his seat, looking up at Yixing with bloodshot eyes and dark, sunken sockets; the man clearly hadn’t slept in days. He stared blankly at Yixing for a moment before blinking a couple times, “Uhm, sorry, did you say something?”

Yixing rolled his eyes and chuckled. He tiptoed his way around several other messy piles before finally reaching a stool near the wall. He shoved the bun in his mouth to free a hand to displace a computer chip off the stool so he could take a seat, only to have Jongdae make a small squeal of distress before taking the circuit board from Yixing with a glare. “Watch it! That’s the operating system of-”

“Mmm, right. It’s important, I get it,” Yixing interrupted, tone disinterested, through a mouthful as he took his midnight snack back into his hand again. His answer was an annoyed scowl before the head of technology turned away to find a new home for the computer chip. “When was the last time you slept, Sparkplug?” he asked, deciding not to offer the cup of coffee as he’d originally planned and taking a sip for himself instead. 

“Uh, sleep?” Jongdae asked, the word falling off his tongue like something foreign that he didn’t recognize. It took a moment for him to understand the question and he blinked a couple times again as his gaze went to the ceiling, mouthing silent numbers before he frowned at Yixing. “That’s not the point,” he grumbled, so distracted he didn’t realise that his comment didn’t make sense.

Yixing shook his head, not sure why he still bothered looking out for Jongdae’s health; he knew the latter always considered eating and sleeping secondary to something as exceptional as the documents Yixing’s camera picked up in William Chan’s office. “So what  _ is _ the point, then?” Yixing asked, setting his coffee down in the only spot of table he could see amidst the mess of half-completed designed and prototypes. 

“Point? What point?” Jongdae replied, trying to get comfortable in his chair again after putting down the board he’d stolen back from Yixing. He pulled his chair forwards, picking up a soldering iron in one hand and a pair of tweezers in the other. “You know I don’t play sports, Agent Zhang,” he mumbled as he leaned forwards to look through his magnifying glass.

Yixing snorted, resisting the urge to continue teasing Jongdae in his sleep-deprived state. Instead, he got to his feet and walked over to Jongdae’s work space, grabbing the Head of Tech-Ops by the elbow and forcibly removing him from his chair. The taller tripped over himself, tools dropping out of his fingers onto the table with a clatter. “Let’s go get something to eat, yeah? On me. Heard the cafeteria had a great soup-of-the-day today. Wanna see if they have any leftovers?” Yixing urged, doubling back to pick up the soldering iron from the table and replace it onto its stand when Jongdae whined. 

“I’m not hungry,” Jongdae argued, trying to pull away from Yixing as the shorter pulled him through the lab. “And it wouldn’t be ‘on you’, Yixing. Food from the cafeteria is free.”

Yixing rolled his eyes again, grip holding steady. Even with his slight limp from the bullet wound in his leg, he was easily ten times stronger than Jongdae on a good day, when his diet wasn’t restricted to energy drinks and gummy worms. It certainly didn’t help that Jongdae spent hours hunched over his desk while Yixing was at the gym. 

Jongdae groaned loudly, “I hate you, Yixing,” he grumbled, stumbling behind Yixing as they made their way towards the elevator. He was no longer actively pulling away from Yixing, but he wasn’t making it particularly easy for the field agent either; he was leaning backwards to shift his center of gravity, making Yixing exert more energy as he hauled him in tow.

“Yup,” Yixing grinned, finally letting go of Jongdae’s arm so that the taller man could fold his arms across his chest with a pout as the duo waited for the elevator.

“I could just run out as soon as the doors start closing and you couldn’t stop me,” Jongdae grumbled with indignation as Yixing stepped into the car and hit the button for the fourth floor. 

“Mmhmm,” Yixing acknowledged in a bored tone, recalling the first time he’d forced Jongdae to take a break three years ago and the tech genius had done exactly as he was suggesting right now. Predictabl, the stint ended with Yixing physically cuffing Jongdae to himself to prevent a second attempt. Jongdae learned quickly after that, eager to avoid a redux of his embarrassing surrender. 

The entire elevator ride down, Jongdae grumbled under his breath about being treated like a child and Yixing ignored him, resisting to urge to tell Jongdae that if he didn’t want to be treated like a child, he should stop acting like one. With the head of tech-ops in tow, still mumbling incoherently, Yixing grabbed a tray and stared at the half empty shelves with a frown; 1 am was obviously not part of the cafeteria’s regular operating hours and the selection of available foods was limited. Looking at the fridge to his right only made him scowl further. “Anything’s better than a Red Bull and a bag of gummy worms,” he muttered to himself (not quietly enough though, given Jongdae’s loud ‘Hey!’ of protest). He grabbed the items closest to him, piling the tray high with an array of fruits, vegetables, and pre-packaged sandwiches from the fridge. 

As satisfied as he could be with his choices, Yixing turned and signalled Jongdae to an empty table at which the latter begrudgingly sat down. Yixing set the tray in front of his fellow employee before rounding the table to take the seat across from Jongdae, grabbing the chocolate pudding that Jongdae had been reaching for. “You’ll get this once you finish everything else,” he berated, taking the cup hostage and setting it down on the seat beside him and away from Jongdae’s reach. Recognizing a lost battle, Jongdae tore open a fruit cup begrudgingly and started to shovel its contents into his mouth, spewing more incoherent comments in Yixing’s direction that the latter ignored.

Yixing waited until the other was almost finished his his sandwich before speaking up, “So what is it this time?” he asked, finally relinquishing the chocolate pudding from captivity.

"Hmm?" Jongdae grumbled as he shoved the last bite into his mouth and stealing the chocolate pudding to his side of the table. "Oh, I was just looking at the pictures you brought back from Chan’s office.”

"Anything interesting?" Yixing prompted, folding his arms along the table.

"Nothing really yet,” Jongdae continued, struggling a moment to wrestle open the packaging of one of the granola bars, “Having a hard time trying to figure everything out, what with it being in some unknown language that linguistics has yet to decode. But the diagrams are  _ fascinating. _ Besides that thing Amber had us chasing that I’m still betting to be some form of battery, there’s also this drawing that I  _ think  _ might be an engine of some sort? They look like they might be a pair but I can’t be sure yet," he explained in between mouthfuls, his hunger finally catching up to him now that he'd started eating. “Really makes you wonder about the history of the world as we know, doesn’t it? I mean, this strange language has to come from  _ somewhere _ right?” He paused, leaning over his tray to whisper to Yixing, “You think it’s alien?”

Yixing shrugged, not sure how to contribute. ExODU5  _ was  _ in the business of extranormal activity, and an alien device certainly fell under its purview. Perhaps this was what Amber wasn’t telling him. Instead, he watched in silence as Jongdae finished his meal with alarming speed and gusto. "All done?" he asked as Jongdae dug into the last bit of his dessert with a burp.

With a nod, Jongdae got to his feet quickly, clearly eager to get back to his work. "Yeah, let's head back."

Yixing chuckled as he lagged behind the other, pulling out his phone to send a quick message to Song Qian in IT. "Where's the fire, Jongdae?" he asked, watching Jongdae poke at the 'up' button repeatedly before shoving his hands under his armpits in an effort to stop himself from fidgetting any more than he already was.

"Why aren’t you more excited?” Jongdae retorted, as though offended that Yixing didn’t quite share his exuberance for unidentifiable and potentially dangerous technology. “Personally, I can’t wait until the linguistics department can finally figure out what language it’s written in so I can get to deciphering all the diagrams on the pages and determining what the  _ thing _ does.” He half-swallowed a yawn awkwardly as he stepped into the elevator, impatience evident in the glare he sent Yixing when the latter made a point of taking his time to get into the car.

Yixing shrugged apologetically as the elevator doors closed and the car began to move, grinning when Jongdae tried to hide another yawn behind his hand as the doors opened to ‘B3’. "Thanks for lunch, Yixing!" Jongdae chirped, stepping up to the glass door to the lab only to have the access panel beep, denying his access. "What the...?" he grumbled, presenting his card once more to the panel to the same result. With slow realisation, he turned to glare, "Really?"

Yixing shrugged, "You know the drill, Sparkplug."

"Why, Xing.  _ Why must you be my personal villain?! _ " Jongdae whined, dramatically clawing at his door despite the amused looks from several other agents on the other side of the glass wall who were clearly not new to this situation.

"I'm not even sure why you're surprised, Sparkplug. We do this  _ every time _ . I force you to eat something besides candy and then we come up here where you complain for at least five minutes about being locked out of your own office. You'll make the argument that you'll just get someone else to give you access to this door, but then you'd still be locked out of your computer. And you'd argue that you could just bypass your computer’s security protocols, but I would just remind you that you yourself wrote the code for the self-regulating security system, promising that it'd take even a genius like you at least 12 hours to get past the first wall. Of course, you are more than welcome to attempt it and I’m not going to stop you, but, you know, you could just go home, take a shower and rest for twenty-four hours when your access will be reinstated automatically and you can go about your work until the next time you forget how to function like a normal human being."

Jongdae glared daggers at Yixing for a long beat and when the field agent didn't offer anything else, he sighed loudly, back hunching over in defeat as he started towards the elevator once more. "I hate you, Yixing," he grumbled over his shoulder.

"Love you too!" Yixing called with a wave goodbye that the latter ignored as he stepped into the elevator, "I'll see you in twenty four hours, Jongdae," he greeted amicably, earning himself a couple of middle fingers as the metal doors closed.

Yixing shook his head as he started towards his desk, only to be grabbed by Kris who slammed Yixing's own tablet into his chest. "Meeting in A, Zhang," was all the information he got before the taller male passed him and hurried towards the mentioned room.

Yixing's eyes narrowed as he scanned the floor, watching as several other agents got to their feet, all heading towards Conference Room A. He picked up his pace is he changed his destination, signing into his tablet and opening his email as he stepped into the meeting only milliseconds before Amber nearly barrelled into his back.

"The mission a couple of days must have spooked him because thanks to the bug Agent Zhang planted in William Chan's office, we now know that the device we were looking for is being transferred  _ tonight _ ." the director started, shooting Yixing an impatient look as he found himself a chair. "The item will be held here in one of his heroin staging warehouses here," an image of the Seoul shipping dock popping onto screen. "We have two hours from when it gets there to when a secure courier arrives to pick it up, after which it'll become virtually impossible to access. We'll be needing a team of six to do a do a quick grab before that window closes." She paused a moment as she scanned the room, "Where the hell is Jongdae?" she asked offhandedly.

"Oh, uh, I had to send him home," Yixing announced in a matter-of-fact tone to knowing 'ahhhh's' around the room and a roll of the eyes from Amber; everyone was familiar with how Jongdae could get when properly excited. 

"I swear to God, that boy. If he wasn't so damn good...," she trailed under her breath before getting back to the topic at hand. “Yixing, I know you want to continue what you started, but you’re still recovering from that leg injury and I’d prefer if you sat this one out,” she explained, putting a hand up to silence Yixing when he opened his mouth to object, “You’ll run this op, but you won’t be going in yourself. Pick six agents to bring with you; I’ll have someone in OpTech to get you remote access to the cameras in the warehouse.” She started for the room door, a clear indication that the meeting was coming to an end, “Wheels up in an hour.”

***

Yixing popped a handful of jellybeans into his mouth, chewing quickly as he waited for everyone to clamber out of the back of the van and join him at the head of the vehicle. He pulled a set of blueprints from their cylindrical case and unrolled them onto the hood. He pulled a marker out from his pocket and, uncapping it between his lips, he marked off three locations with the letters 'A', 'B', and 'C'  on the building layout before capping the marker.

"Alright, let’s go over the plan again," he started once all six of his team surrounded him, dressed in their tactical gear, helmet masks raised. "Team Alpha will be Jongin and Soojung; Sunyoung and Kyungsoo will make up Team Bravo. Kris, you'll go with Wendy on Team Charlie. As discussed back at HQ, each team will be responsible for securing a specific location." Yixing proceeded to outline to each team what areas they were to cover with the marker, reminding each team of their assignment once they approached the building on the other side of the shipping containers from where they were parked.

"Priority is retrieving the device,” Yixing asserted, putting down the picture that spawned their last mission at ‘Lady Luck’ on top of the building blueprints. “This is a stealth job, so do not engage any potential hostiles. I don’t want any casualties unless absolutely necessary." Yixing stopped to look up, meeting every single member in the eye before continuing, "I can't stress enough how important that we get that device, whatever it is, before this window of opportunity disappears but above that,  _ stay safe _ . Look out for each other. We still have no idea what we're dealing with here and it's better to be safe than sorry. IT managed to break into their surveillance system remotely, so I'll be watching you guys from here but I can't see everything. You are to keep me apprised of any developments the second they arise, is that understood?” A round of uncoordinated ‘yessirs’ was mumbled, and Yixing stood up properly with his arms across his his chest, "Well? What are you guys still standing here for? Get to your stations and check-in!" he commanded, sending the members scattering to their assigned locations.

"Kris," Yixing called out, reaching a hand out to grab the newest team member around the elbow and turning him around to address properly, "Wendy is one of our strongest and I paired you with her for a reason, you'll do well to learn from her," he said simply before sending him chasing after his partner.

With a deep breath, he rolled up the blueprints once more and jogged around the van to the back door, climbing in and taking a seat behind the litany of computer screens mounted on the walls. Glancing briefly at the camera footage, he put on the headset resting on one of the keyboards, checking his wrist once more.

"Where we at, people?" he prompted as he watched six red dots racing across his screen to their designations.

"Alpha's in position."

"Charlie's good to go."

"Bravo's ready on your command, sir."

Yixing grunted an acknowledgement of everyone's check-in, narrowing his eyes at one particular camera where a security guard was pacing aimlessly. "Bravo, there's going to be immediate resistance if you enter right now but Alpha and Charlie are cleared to enter."

"Copy that."

Yixing's attention returned to the uniformed guard on screen, waiting for him to move away from Bravo's entrance. He frowned when a whole minute later, the security guard was still pacing. He narrowed his eyes at the image, pulling the camera out of its 4-in-1 view to a screen of its own. Yixing cursed a moment later when the image skipped a split second; someone had replaced the live camera feed with pre-recorded video. He hurried to check every other feed on his system, cursing internally when they all showed the same skip after approximately 20 seconds. He chewed on his bottom lip anxiously, "Something's wrong guys, the security feeds have been looped;  _ approach with caution _ . Bravo, go on and head inside too, but do so cautiously." 

Before Yixing could put in a request for the other teams to report what was happening inside, Soojung piped up in his ear, "Alpha's got one guard, make that two guards down in the main security office. Someone's already been here. And whoever it was, they didn't quite have the restraint we do."

Yixing swallowed at the news. William Chan certainly had many competitors that might be looking to profit from a sudden disappearance of his product but that seemed too much of a coincidence at the moment, "All teams proceed with caution, safeties off. The objective remains the same. We need to confirm the location of that device and bring it home." 

Voices of ascent echoed in his ear and Yixing continued to watched each screen despite their now obsolete information. Yixing waited as patiently as he could for a couple minutes before speaking again “Updates, everyone.”

“Except the two dead guards from earlier, it’s looking all clear for Alpha.”

“No sign of, well,  _ anything _ here, sir,” Sunyoung supplied. “It’s been quiet ever since we entered. Not a single soul in sight.”

There was a long silence where the third team should have provided an update. 

“Charlie, report,” Yixing prompted with static for a reply. “Olaf! Qinglong!” Yixing called again, starting to pace in the cramped space of the van. 

“It’s Zitao,” Kris’ voice finally replied, raspy as though he was still recovering from a punch to the throat, “He surprised us and got in a good cut on Olaf. I’m going after him.”

“No, stay with Olaf,” Yixing ordered as he picked up his phone and dialed the number to ExODU5’s operations support line, requesting medical personnel. 

“She’s fine,” Kris retorted, “ _ He’s getting away with the device! _ ” 

“ _ Stay where you are, Qinglong! _ ” Yixing ordered, voice rising in volume, “Alpha and Bravo teams have not confirmed their areas secure and I’m blind in here. We don’t know how many others there are and we need to make sure Olaf gets somewhere safe before we figure out our next move.”

“She’s fine!” Kris repeated, his voice coming across the earpiece out of breath as his marker on the screen moved quickly away from Wendy’s.

Yixing clenched his jaw, “ _ Then why isn’t she telling me that herself?!”  _ Yixing shot back, volume rising as he started to get annoyed at Kris’ disobedience. “You are to  _ stay put _ , Qinglong, and wait for backup. Do  _ not _ pursue Zitao. Is that understood?”

There was static in Yixing’s ear as he waited for a reply and when he didn’t receive any confirmation, he cursed loudly into his mouthpiece before taking a deep breath to calm himself, “Alpha, Bravo, what’re your statuses?”

“Alpha area is clean, sir,” Jongin confirmed.

“We’ve still got a couple rooms to sweep here.”

“Alright Kai, you and Krystal head on over to Charlie area, find Olaf and bring her to safety. I’ve got medical on the way. Luna and D.O., you finish up and head on over once you’re done and  _ find Qinglong _ . I hope to God that idiot’s still alive.”

“On our way,” Jongin chirped.

“Keep me updated.” Yixing rubbed the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger as he  continued to pace; why the hell was Huang Zitao here and how did he know about the device before ExODU5? Yixing crossed and uncrossed his arms nervously as he watched the red dots advance on the satellite-provided image, the only screen he had now that projected trustworthy data

“We have Olaf,” Soojung reported after what felt like an eternity, “She’s breathing, but barely conscious. She’s also got a nasty gash right under her vest and it looks likes she’s lost a lot of blood, but I can’t tell if any major organs sustained any damage.”

“Can she move?” Yixing asked, worry starting to colour his voice when there was no immediate reply and he had to repeat himself.

“We’re working on it,” Jongin assured, though his tone sounded less confident than Yixing would’ve liked.

Yixing took another deep breath, his hand reaching shakily into his hair, ‘ _ This was supposed to be a simple operation! A simple recovery op!’ _ he yelled in his head. “Luna, what’s your status?” he asked, careful not to let his inner worry take control of his voice.

“Charlie sector almost cleared, sir, but no sign of Qinglong or Huang Zitao anywhere yet. They might have headed outside. Did you want us to head out there once we finish in here?”

A long bang sounded at the van’s back door that made Yixing jump, the sound of his heart pounding against his ribcage deafening in his ear. He instinctively reached for the gun in his holster and pointed it in the direction of the sound. 

“Sir?” Sunyoung asked once more. 

“Standby,” Yixing replied quietly into his headset before clicking the safety on his gun off. He drew a deep breath before taking another step, right hand gripping his weapon firmly as his left reached for the handle cautiously. He opened a door half an inch before his hand came back up to support the other as he aimed it carefully at the entrance. He nudged the door open the rest of the way with his foot, letting out a long sigh when the image of a helmetless Kris greeted him, panting from exertion as one hand wiped at the crimson liquid spilling from above his eyebrow and the other hand held up a small package.

“You gunna let me in or what?” Kris asked in a cocky tone that made Yixing want to add another bruise to the already cut-up face. 

With a loud groan and a roll of his eyes, he reholstered his gun, “Negative, Luna. Rendez-vous with Kai and see what you can do for Olaf. Medical should be here soon, I’ll have them head towards your location. Meet you guys at the hospital.”

“What about-?” Kyungsoo started, only to have Yixing cut him off abruptly. 

“He’s back with me. We’ll see you soon.”

“He’s okay then?” Soojung asked, the sound of urgent voices in the background and a siren; they must’ve managed to get Wendy to the ambulance or vice versa.

Yixing spun around to shoot Kris a glare that the taller didn’t notice; he’d moved to take a seat in one of the stools bolted to the floor of the van, his posture relaxed as if he  _ hadn’t _ just disobeyed a direct order and consequently endangering the life of a fellow agent. Kris didn’t deserve Soojung’s worry. 

“For now,” Yixing growled through gritted teeth.

There was a quiet moment before Jongin came on the line again, an almost amused tone to his voice, “Think about the paperwork, Kirin,” he warned jokingly before the line went quiet again. 

Yixing tore the headpiece off his head and tossed it into the corner of the tablet with a loud clatter, continuing to glare daggers at Kris as he did so. His jaw clenched, holding back all the potential outbursts as he reached into a cupboard for a specimen bag and gestured for Kris to deposit the package he’d retrieved. Sending Kris another scathing look, he tucked the device safely into a side compartment. Without another word, he stepped out of the van and rounded it to the driver’s seat, starting the engine wordlessly and barely waiting for Kris to buckle himself in in the back of the van before throwing it into reverse and backing out of their parked position. 

Not a single word was exchanged during the drive to the ExODU5-owned hospital. Yixing sepnt the majority of the drive providing a verbal debrief to Amber over the ExODU5 radio while Kris sat in the back quietly (luckily for the taller, he had gotten smart enough not to try to start a conversation when they stepped through the emergency room entrance together). The first time Yixing acknowledged Kris’ presence since the latter appeared unannounced at the van without his teammates was when he pointed towards the triage desk, muttering that Kris should get his injuries looked at. 

Director Liu was already there, sitting in the waiting area across a young girl accompanied by an older man and woman who Yixing assumed to be Wendy’s family. The rest of his team was scattered around the large room, still in their operations fatigues. 

With time to decompress now, he recognized the container the device was in and a wave of guilt washed over him; it was the metal case that had been in Chan’s safe that he’d so carelessly dismissed. If he’d taken the time to investigate the case back at  _ Lady Luck _ , Wendy would probably not be in surgery right now. He clenched his jaw, trying to remind himself that he couldn’t always control what happened in the field. 

Taking a deep breath, Yixing looked up at his team and with a quick wave of his hand, he signalled for them to join him in the corner where he told them to go home.

“With all due respect, sir,” Jongin replied almost immediately, nearly cutting Yixing off, “I think I speak for all of us when I say we’d prefer to stay.”

“I think I’ve had enough insubordinance for one day,” Yixing snapped before realising he was taking out his frustration on his team. He took a deep breath and tried again in a softer tone, “Go home, guys. Take a shower, get something to eat. It’ll probably be a while. Besides, this might be an ExODU5 owned hospital, but there are still civilians here. You guys stick out like a sore thumb with all that gear on.” There was hesitation from all the members. “Look, I promise to call you guys the instant anything changes, alright?”

It was at least another minute before Yixing successfully convinced them to leave, asking that they take the van back to headquarters, explaining where he’d stowed the device and to leave with Analysis. 

Yixing made his way back to the waiting area, making sure to make his presence known to Amber should she need anything from him; When she waved him off, he made his way to towards the triage nurse, asking to be let in to see Kris. 

Reluctant as most triage nurses were about allowing admission to unnecessary peoplel, Yixing had to promise to be in and out within five minutes before the nurse buzzed him inside, pointing vaguely behind Yixing and muttering a ‘ _ he’s in bed C13’ _ before turning back to her patient. 

After one wrong left turn, Yixing finally located Kris, face no longer covered in blood and a piece of guage bandaged to the left part of his forehead. “You alright?” he asked, trying to keep his voice calm but failing to conceal his irritated scowl. 

“Yeah, clean bill of health,” Kris replied, pointing to the bandage across his forehead, “Looked worse than it actually was, you know how head wounds are.”

“You’re signed off to leave then?” Yixing asked, not acknowledging his urge to simply grab Kris around the collar and drag the taller man behind him. Kris nodded, opening his mouth to add something before Yixing cut him off, “Good, then get up,” he ordered, voice turning stern as he spun around on his heel and started back out the way he came in, “We need to talk.” He silenced a nurse who looked ready to object, asking as politely as he could muster to send the bill (and any other necessary documentation) to the address he wrote down on the back of the closest piece of paper he could get his hands on. Hardly bothering to wait for a confirmation, he pushed past her and hit the ‘exit’ button to let himself out, pace never slowing to check that Kris was still following behind him as he took a sharp turn towards the main wing of the hospital, stealing into an empty hallway that lead to a side exit. 

“How long do you think it’ll take for them to figure out what the thing does?” Kris started conversationally, leaning lazily against the wall across from Yixing when the latter finally stopped walking. 

Yixing frowned when he turned around to meet Kris’ eye, “What the hell happened back there?” he demanded, his voice stern as he brought his arms up to fold across his chest, trying to make his disapproval as evident as possible.

“Uh, the doctor said the injury wasn’t too deep and that I just need to make sure I keep it from getting infected.”

Yixing scowled, “I mean  _ before _ that, Agent Wu. When we were back at the warehouse,” he prompted, his frustration starting to make his voice rise, echoing in the empty hallway.

There was a flicker of confusion across Kris’ features before he realised what Yixing was referring to. He didn’t answer immediately, letting out a deep sigh as he slouched down against the wall, waiting for Yixing to break the silence first.

“You disobeyed a direct order, Kris Wu,” Yixing all but shouter, clearing his throat when he realised how loud his voice had gotten, echoing off the walls. 

“I retrieved the device as required,” Kris answered, his tone an annoying matter-of-fact, “That’s what the mission objective was, right? Director Liu herself said that we didn’t have much of a window to retrieve the damn thing. All I did was  _ my job _ .”

“Your job includes keeping your teammates safe and  _ alive _ !” Yixing snapped, feeling angry heat floor into his ears. He forced himself to take a deep breath, trying to remind himself that Kris Wu was still new to ExODU5, that he should already have expected this type of behaviour from him given what he’d read in the man’s personnel file. “You’ve been in the field for several years,” Yixing started in a noticeably softer tone (though the bite was still weaved into it), “So you should know that things can change in the blink of an eye. The second we learned that Huang Zitao was on location and that he had the device in his possession, that window we had was no longer an issue. We could track Huang down and a second team could have gone after the device. I know you’ve only been at Exodus for a couple weeks now but there is only one rule that you don’t break: you  _ never _ leave a teammate behind,  _ especially _ if they’re hurt.”

Kris had his face turned away, his lips pressed into a haughty pout as he mumbled under his breath, “She wasn’t hit anywhere fatal.”

“In the field, you don’t know that,” Yixing snapped, taking a step forward and grabbing a fistful of Kris’ shirt, forcing the latter to drop his head and meet his steely gaze. “You’re lucky the paramedics said nothing major was hit, but I swear to God, Agent Wu, if you ever pull something stupid like that again, I don’t care what deal you have with Director Liu,  _ you’re out _ .” Yixing watched Kris’ jaw clench and unclench several times and waited until the defensive look in Kris’ eyes cooled before he let go of Kris’ shirt and took a step backwards, forcing himself to take a deep breath before speaking again. “It’s been a long night, Kris. Head back to HQ and get that report done up before you go hom. I’ll see you in the morning,” he dismissed, turning on his heel and heading back towards the emergency room waiting area, not bothering to wait for any sort of response from Kris. 

Back in the waiting room, Amber had her chin cradled in her hand, elbows on her knees. She was alone now, having left Wendy’s parents to themselves on the other side of the room. When she saw Yixing return, his posture straightened and she gestured to the empty seat next to her.

“Any news?” Yixing asked softly as he sat down. 

“Nothing yet,” Amber replied before gesturing in the direction Yixing had just returned from and leaning back against her seat with a knowing grin, “Saw you pull Kris aside. Set him straight, then?”

“I dunno, Ber,” Yixing sighed forcefully, leaning backwards until the back of his head hit the wall behind him with a soft  _ clunk,  _ “You and I have worked together for what? Almost sixteen years now since we were classmates back at local police academy? And you know I trust your judgement, but I really have to wonder if bringing him onto the team was really the right call?”

Amber chortled lightly, joining Yixing in leaning against the back wall, “I wonder,” she replied vaguely, offering no further insight as the two sat in silence, waiting for an update from the doctors.


	3. Two Halves Make a Whole (Lot of a Mess)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Before the team has a handle on what the strange device's function is, they have a lead on the whereabouts of its second half.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry if anyone is actually following this fic for updates; life got a little busy in the last week or so and I've only been able to get at this chapter in bits and pieces. I'll try to get the next chapter in Sorry for the lack of... anything hahaha I swear I'll get to some fanxing interactions soon (I'm pretty sure next chapter, they get some one-on-one time??? I think????), I just have to set up this awful story line first D; And also sorry in advance for some nerdiness xD

By the time Jongdae returned to work from his forced rest, preliminary analysis of the device retrieved from Chan’s warehouse had already been complete. Carbon dating had the device’s age at more than three thousand years old, “Which doesn’t make  _ any _ sense,” Jongdae had remarked adamantly when he’d looked over the results with Yixing hovering nearby. 

“You even have clearance to that information?” Yixing asked idly as he tried to find a place to sit in the lab, now impossibly messier than the last time he’d been here, hauling Jongdae off to the cafeteria. 

Jongdae stopped pacing a moment to look up at Yixing sheepishly, “Uhm, yes?” 

Yixing raised an eyebrow skeptically, “Was that a question?”

Jongdae swallowed visibly, “Okay, maybe not,” he finally admitted, the tips of his ears turning a bright red, “But they took it away to run every conceivable test on it. I never even got to see it with my own eyes because  _ someone _ locked me out yesterday. So if we’re going to be blaming anyone, I’m pretty sure this is  _ your _ fault. If I’d been here when it first arrived, I could’ve-”

Yixing put his hand up to stop Jongdae’s monologue, “It’s fine, Jongdae,” he started, grinning when Jongdae visibly relaxed. “Amber’s locking me out too and I want to know what was so important about this device that one of my teammates nearly died over.”By the time Yixing had returned to headquarters from the hospital, the device had already been transferred to the ExODU2 lab across the country. When he’d called to ask Amber about it, she’d dismissed his concerns, telling him that ‘it was being taken care of’. When he pressed for more information, she’d snapped at him to get his reports finished and then promptly hung up on him. 

Jongdae rolled his eyes, “Don’t exaggerate. Wendy didn’t  _ nearly die.  _ It was just a flesh wound. She’s perfectly fine now, right?”

Yixing narrowed his eyes at Jongdae’s lack of tact, though it was in vain; Jongdae was distracted by the tablet again. “Yes, she’s fine, Mister Sensitive,” he remarked sarcastically. “In any case, I want to know and I knew you’d worm your way in.”

Jongdae didn’t reply, having returned to pacing along his workbench, chewing on his left thumbnail as he read the report from his tablet. Yixing gave him a few minutes before piping up again, “Okay, so what is it?” 

Jongdae looked up abruptly with wide eyes and mouth agape as if he’d forgotten Yixing had been there for over five minutes now. “Uh,” he managed clumsily, fumbling for his words as he blinked a couple times, “A micro-generator? I think?” He guessed, his expression an extension of the unsure tone in his voice. “Like I said, this…  _ whatever _ is way advanced and I can only guess. Here, take a look.” Jongdae stopped pacing and headed towards his holo-table, placing his tablet on the input platform. “You see this area here?” he asked Yixing, pointing somewhere near the top left corner of the image that flickered to life from the table’s projectors.

“Uh….” Yixing stared at the projected image blankly, and then over to Jongdae, “Sure?” he answered uneasily. Besides the general blue hue of the device outline, Yixing had no idea what anything being displayed was. 

Jongdae made a motion and the hologram blew up to reveal several component inside its bronze-like outer casing. “It’s supposedly got small diamond plates inside acting as an array of refractors, which is pretty cool but also pretty fucking impossible.”

“What do you mean? There’s plenty of tech out there that’s diamond plated.”

Jongdae frowned, “No, I mean actual diamond plates, not plat _ ed. _ ”

Yixing sighed impatiently, “The distinction is lost on me.”

Jongdae threw his hands up in exasperation, “Diamond  _ plated _ is when you spray very small particles of diamond on something and it makes this film-like feature. This report though,” he grabbed the tablet, gesturing with it wildly, “Is saying that they managed to make a _ whole plate _ of diamond, like… with parallel sides. Which, like I said, should be impossible.” 

“... Of course…,” Yixing agreed uneasily, not sure how he should respond to something he didn’t understand. 

Jongdae glared at Yixing for a moment before he tossed the tablet to his desk and grabbed the nearest sheet of paper and a pen. “Do you know the chemical composition of diamond?”

Yixing scowled at the Jongdae’s tone. The tech expert had an IQ of several of ExODU5’s finest agents  _ combined _ , but the social competence of a rock; he didn’t  _ mean _ to sound condescending, he just did whenever he tried to explain anything he thought should be a basic concept. 

“I might not have two PhDs like some geniuses in this room, but I  _ did _ finish high school,” Yixing  answered, not surprised when Jongdae didn’t react to the snarky tone, waiting expectantly. “Carbon,” Yixing answered begrudgingly. 

“Yes, that’s correct,” Jongdae replied, drawing a large ‘C’ in the center of the page. “Which, if you recall from high school chemistry, is the same chemical composition of our good friend, graphite. Or, for those of you less science-inclined,” Jongdae continued (unaware of his potentially offensive), plucking the nearest pencil from the table, “Is pencil lead.” He took the pencil in both hands and proceeded to snap it in two with an excited grin, “Made of the same stuff, but not quite as sturdy,” he remarked, tossing the two ends to Yixing and turning back to his piece of paper with pen in hand.

Yixing caught the broken pencil easily, discarding them to the side on the table before moving to stand beside Jongdae. “Graphite’s natural structure is planar, which means it’s like a sheet of paper,” he began to explain, holding the page up and then stabbing his pen through it at Yixing who blinked in alarm. “Like I said, not so sturdy.” He bent over again and began drawing something incomprehensible on the side of the paper without the pen hole. “Have you ever seen diamonds in their natural form? I mean before they get all cut up to be sold as useless jewelry?”

“Of course.”

“Then I’m sure you’re noticed their natural shape then?” Jongdae asked again, pausing only for a moment before continuing to draw rough lines. “Not perfect cubes or anything resembling cubes, right?

Yixing took a moment to recall the uncut diamonds he’d exchanged on past missions. “Hm, now that you mention it, no. But they’re uncut, so they could look like anything.”

Jongdae rolled his eyes, “Don’t you ever wonder why they don’t cut diamonds into cubes then? I mean it’d be a lot simpler than that ridiculous shape they sell diamonds in.”

“Well, I doubt they’d get quite as many customers with such a boring shape,” Yixing retorted facetiously.

Jongdae glared at Yixing for the comment, “It’s because they can’t cut them that way, Special Agent Zhang,” he replied haughtily. 

Yixing sighed long, “I’m going to regret this, but uh, why?”

“ _ Haven’t you been paying attention?!” _ Jongdae all but yelled, holding up his paper angrily with a shake, the edges wrinkling as he pointed at the drawing on the right that moderately resembled a floating squiggle in a cube. When Yixing stared at it blankly for a long moment, Jongdae sighed loudly and threw the page up in defeat. “ _ Crystalline structures!” _ He said, as if it was the most obvious answer. 

“Riiiiiight,” Yixing returned slowly, wondering to himself if this might be a good time to start regretting coming to Jongdae about the device (but he was tired of calling it  _ the device _ , he wanted a  _ name  _ for whatever it was). 

“Sugar and salt,” Jongdae began again, clearly determined to get his point across, “When you forget to label your jars, how do you tell the difference between the two?”

“Uhm, I take a pinch of what I think is sugar and put it on my tongue. With my luck, it’s probably salt and I make a face. Works like a charm,” Yixing answered chuckled, knowing that this was likely not the response Jongdae was looking for. He laughed when Jongdae’s face darkened, ears turning red again, this time with barely contained rage, not embarrassment. 

“Salt is cubic!” Jongdae corrected, taking his pen again and pressing it to another piece of paper. He wrote the letters Na and Cl repeated in a square pattern, joining them with lines. “And sugar, well  _ sucrose _ is more complex,” he explained, sliding the page over and starting to draw a pair of hexagons. When he looked up to see Yixing’s disinterested look, his hand faltered, “Okay, you don’t need to know the structure of sugar,” he deigned to admit, “But you’ve had rock candy, right? Like on a stick? That’s just plain sugar, but like… bigger,” Jongdae trailed, running out of words as he watched Yixing grow more and more disinterested. He cleared his throat and tried again, “Simply put, sugar doesn’t have a cubic structure, so when you look inside a jar of salt and a jar of sugar, you can tell they look different.”

Yixing crossed his arms, his expression a clear representation of his perplexion (with a side of boredom), “Sparkplug, I asked you why the machine is impossible and now we’re talking about salt and sugar… why?”

Jongdae frowned, clearly displeased that his efforts to educate had failed. He clenched and unclenched his hands, clearly contemplating how to properly explain his opinion to Yixing. “Diamonds are strong for a reason. Take trusses on a bridge. If you took away a bunch of those connections, the bridge wouldn’t hold right? Well that’s exactly what they did to the so-called diamonds in this device. They took away the bonds that made them strong, which  _ should’ve _ just collapsed the structure, but for some reason, it still exhibits all the physical characteristics of diamond. I should really stop calling it diamond, because it’s clearly  _ not, _ but-”

Yixing put up a hand to stop Jongdae from going off on another tangent, “Why is that important,  _ in layman terms _ ,” he added emphatically.

“I told you already. This device, it’s literally impossible, on a molecular level, based on what we know today in science. Beautiful, no doubt, but really fucking impossible. This shouldn’t exist,” Jongdae hesitated, collapsing into a chair, “At least not here on earth.”

There was a moment of silence between the two as Yixing wrapped his head around the fact that Jongdae’s initial suspicions were right and that the device was most likely  _ alien _ , alien  _ and  _ over three thousand years old. 

“Anyway,” Jongdae said, breaking the silence, “Linguistics thinks they’ve just about got a working language key that they can use on that manuscript in Chan’s safe. I left them a message to get working on page 36 before anything else so I can properly figure out what this thing does.” Jongdae paused for a moment, expression pensive before he got up and started towards the door, “Actually, I better go tell them in person,” he mumbled to himself as he picked up his pace, clearly having forgotten that he was still in Yixing’s company.

“Yeah, that’s a great idea, Sparkplug,” Yixing called after Jongdae as the door closed, doubtful that the latter even heard him in his hurry. Shaking his head in amusement at Jongdae’s thought process, Yixing picked up the tablet - consequently turning off the holo-table - and took a seat on the nearest chair, kicking his feet up on the table. He rocked backwards on two of the four legs as he flipped through the multitude of pages of chemical and physical reports he didn’t have the patience (or knowledge, if he was being honest) to decipher. 

Halfway through yet another page with unintelligible technical drawings, Yixing felt his phone rumble in his pocket. ‘ _ My office. Now. _ ’ He dropped his feet to the floor, leveling his chair with a loud ‘clunk’, before standing up. He didn’t bother sending Amber a reply, shoving the phone back into his pocket as he made for her office. 

“What’s up?” he asked when he opened the office door without knocking, settling into one of the chairs across from the director. 

“You ever heard of knocking?” Amber growled, looking away from her computer screen only to glare at Yixing for a brief second before returning to work. 

Yixing shrugged, “Sometimes I knock, sometimes I don’t.”

Amber would frown deeper if it were possible but instead, she just sighed, finally spinning in her chair to properly face Yixing. 

“Chan found the chip in his office,” Amber announced, “Frankly, I’m actually a little surprised it took them this long,” she continued when Yixing raised an eyebrow and opened his mouth to reply. “Suppose the leak about moving that device made him a little more cautious.”

“Speaking of which, Jongdae is under the impression that it… well, it might be alien.” Yixing watching Amber for any signs of surprise and when she remained expressionless, he sighed. “Well of course you already knew,” he mumbled. “Did you know when we set out on those recovery missions, or did you just find out?”

Amber rolled her eyes, “Well we  _ are  _ a department of  _ extranormal operations _ . This should hardly come as a surprise to you.” She paused to cross her arms on her chest, “And how does Kim Jongdae have access to any of the information that led him to this conclusion?”

“He doesn’t, it was just a theory he came up with while he was home,” Yixing answered quickly, perhaps  _ too _ quickly given the look Amber gave him. He cleared his throat, “So… Chan?” he prompted, eager to take the spotlight off of Jongdae’s less-than-standard-procedure ways and back to the proper villain at hand. 

Amber stared hard back at Yixing for a long moment before she deigned to change the subject, “He found the bug in his office, he smashed the thing to pieces under his foot. But, on the upside, we did manage to catch Chan saying something about where the device’s other half might be. It’s a phone call so it’s only one sided.” She turned to her computer once more, hitting a few buttons before Chan’s distorted voice played over her speakers. 

“I need to talk to him, it’s urgent.”

Yixing’s jaw clenched as he contemplated who Chan could be talking to but he kept his thoughts to himself, waiting patiently for the rest of the recording. There was a vague rhythmic tapping in the background that Yixing guessed to be Chan pacing in his office; whoever ‘him’ was, he made Chan  _ nervous.  _

“There was a complication,” Chan continued after a long pause. “The device, it’s… it’s gone. I’ve got people working on getting it ba-,” he stopped, interrupted by whoever he was talking to. “You don’t sound… concerned…”

There was another long pause, “Of course. We already have a plan for the other half. It’s at Three-Six-Five Labs; Lee has it there for testing cus the idiot’s got no idea what he managed to get his hands on. I’m already assembling a team-.”

There was a sudden high pitched sound that resembled feedback and Yixing flinched, having been partly distracted with trying to piece together in his head why two rival  _ street _ gangs would be after the same piece of ancient technology that ExODU5 was concerned with. 

Chan’s voice came back on the recording, panicked. “Shit, shit, shit!” Chan spat, before there was a loud sound that sounded like a phone being slammed onto a hard surface. Another moment later, there was a loud crackling, then static, then nothing. 

“Three-Six-Five Labs,” Yixing repeated after a moment when he was sure that the recording was finished. “Guess that’s where I’m headed then?”

Amber reached behind her for a pamphlet and set it down on the desk with a wide grin, “And this is your way in.”

Yixing leaned forwards in his chair to retrieve the brochure, groaning loudly when he read the heading, “This is because I didn’t knock, isn’t it?”

Amber laughed lightly, “No, for  _ that _ , you’re going to take Kris with you.” She pulled a data drive from her computer and handed it to Yixing as well, glancing at her doorway in a sign of dismissal. 

Yixing sighed loudly and grabbed the drive from Amber with more force than it required before turning and leaving. 

***

After searching the entire office floor, Yixing finally learned from Jongin that Kris was at the shooting range. He grabbed a pair of muffs from the wall and joined Kris at his station, watching the latter put up a paper target and sending it down the lane.

“Wendy’s awake,” Yixing piped up as Kris released the magazine from his gun and picked up a handful of bullets to fill it. “You know, just in case you decided to be a decent human being and actually care for once in your life," Yixing continued, noting the slight hesitation between bullets five and six as Kris filled his magazine for another round.

"I don't," Kris shot back, not bothering to turn around to face Yixing as he locked the magazine back in place.

"You really are an asshole," Yixing scowled, only to get a shrug in return. "Were you not hugged as a child or something?" he asked rhetorically.

Kris ignored the comment, pulling his ear muffs over his head. He didn't turn to check if Yixing had done the same before he raised his weapon and took aim.

Yixing sighed, putting on his own pair of muffs and crossing his arms as he watched the taller empty the magazine in the center of the target on the paper target. He raised an intrigued eyebrow, mildly impressed that someone in local law enforcement had such good grouping.

When Kris was finally done and he'd set the target to return to him, he pulled his ear muffs off and turned to Yixing with a long sigh, "Was there something you wanted?"

Yixing scowled, his momentary positive impression immediately replaced by irritation for being addressed so informally; he  _ was _ Kris’ superior after all. "When you're done showing off to yourself, suit up. We've got a mission," Yixing stated flatly. He stepped forwards slightly to slam the data stick on the counter in front of Kris, next to the gun. "I'll be in tech-ops," he said flatly before turning to leave. "Try not to screw this one up too." 

***

“Names?” 

“Er Yuehong and Xia Mu,  _ For Life Pharmaceuticals _ ,” Yixing answered quickly, fidgeting around the pile of file folders in his arms as Kris stood quiet beside him, shifting slightly on the spot to straighten his backpack. 

The receptionist at the desk glanced down at his tablet and scrolled through a long list of names, tapping the screen a couple times before looking back up at Kris and Yixing with a smile. “Right, welcome to  _ The Diamond Group’s  _ 53rd medical science conference. Here are your badges, and a schedule of all the panels, workshops, demonstrations, tours,  _ et cetera  _ that will be happening over the course of this week. The opening speech is being held is down the hallway on your left and through the second door on your right. If you have any questions, just look for anyone in a turquoise t-shirt and they would be more than happy to help you on your way.”

Kris smiled and took both passes eagerly, “Thank you! I’m really looking forward to all the panels with Dr. Yang. Her cancer detection microtechnology is fascinating and positively groundbreaking, don’t you think?”

The receptionist offered little more than a crooked smile before gesturing to the side and waiting for the duo to depart before waving the next person in line. 

“See, you do know how to be friendly when you want to,” Yixing remarked with a chuckle as they followed the crowd towards the main auditorium. He felt grossly out of place as he eyed the rest of the participants at the convention. Yixing wasn’t stupid by any measure, but he was also nowhere near Jongdae’s level. “How the hell do you know about whatever microtechnology thing you just said, anyway?” Yixing asked, looking around the venue and locating the elevator to the secured upper levels not open to the public during the convention. 

“It’s called properly preparing for an op, Zhang Yixing,” Kris replied sarcastically, flipping through the pamphlet the receptionist had handed him as if he was sincerely interested in the seminars being offered. “Two guards in front of the elevators and another pair roaming the front and side entrances,” he confirmed, still acting enthralled by the conference itinerary. “Path to the back is clear.”

“I’m going in,” YIxing muttered to Kris under his breath, receiving a small nod of acknowledgement before he pulled away from the line and headed towards his target.

The volunteers in turquoise seemed to be located every fifty meters and Yixing had to get creative to make his way unseen towards the back of the building, slipping in and out of the crowd of conference attendees before he caught sight of the lone guard roaming the hallway in front of the west stairwell, a card reader next to the entrance. 

“Excuse me?” Yixing called as he neared the stairwell, not slowing his pace even as the guard held her hand up for Yixing to stop. 

“Sir, this area is restricted.”

“I was just hoping you could help me?” Yixing asked, putting on his best ‘desperately lost tourist’ look. “I was looking for a volunteer but I can’t seem to find one.”

The guard glanced behind Yixing and then around them before facing Yixing again with disappointment evident in her features. “The auditorium is back that way,” she said curtly, stepping around Yixing and holding an arm out beside here to usher Yixing alongside. 

“Yes, my friend is in line to get a seat for me and I figured that I might as well get a good handle of where the rooms for the panels are?” Yixing led the guard lead him a few meters before he stopped abruptly and began digging into the pile of messy files in his arms. He’d stashed the itinerary he’d received from the receptionist in the middle of his pile and he pulled it out with a dramatic fumble. “Xia Mu and I are really excited about Dr. Yang’s demonstration. If I recall properly, it should be in room 106 but I seem to have gotten myself all turned around in this place,” he added a nervous chuckle for effect, noting the annoyed roll of the eyes from the guard beside him as he yanked the book out from the pile, sending the majority of the files in his arms falling to the floor. He let out several apologies and dropped to his knees, scrambling to gather the pages together.

There was a loud sigh above Yixing and a moment later, the guard joined Yixing in a crouch, reaching for the pages nearest to them. “Thanks so much,” Yixing gushed, with a quiet grunt for a response as the guard began reaching for the contents that had spilled halfway out of the last folder left on the floor. “I’m such a klutz,” Yixing explained, reaching into his pocket for the aerosol sleeping agent that Jongdae had prepared for him. “My partner would kill me if I lost all this data,” he continued to explain, distracting the guard from his hand. When the guard moved to hand Yixing his files, the latter swiftly brought his hand up to spray the woman with the drug. 

“What the,” the guard exclaimed in a brief moment of lucidity before her eyes closed and the file fell from her unconscious hand. 

Yixing caught the guard at the last moment with his free hand and set her down slowly on the floor, “Guard’s down,” Yixing announced into his watch as he picked up the pages once more and tossed them into the nearest trash can. He grabbed the guard’s security pass from her belt and proceeded to drag the unconscious body towards the stairwell, unlocking the door with the pass. “I’m heading to the lab. I’m leaving the card in the plant to the right of the door; server farm should be on the third floor,” he reminded Kris as he started to climb the steps, even though he knew the taller didn’t need the reminder. 

“Copy that,” Kris confirmed in a whisper that did not conceal his resentment.

 

Yixing stepped out onto the 11th floor slightly breathless as he checked around him for any resistance. Kris piped up in his ear to confirm that he’d arrived at his destination and was in the process of downloading the files they’d come for. “Good, I’m almost at the lab,” Yixing said in return, keeping his voice down as he eyed the hallway in front and behind him for any unexpected surprises as he searched for the right room number. 

The sound of a door opening in front of him echoed in the sterile hallway followed by incomprehensible conversation by a couple in lab jackets. Yixing ducked quickly behind a wall pillar and reluctantly prepared himself for a confrontation; there wasn’t supposed to any civilians here on a Saturday afternoon. Whispers combined with hurried footsteps echoed off the white walls as they drew closer and Yixing hoped that it would be enough to cover up his breathing, still uneven from his sprint up over a dozen steps. 

When they passed by his location though, the two scientists were so focused on their discussion that they didn’t even notice the barely hidden intruder and YIxing let out a sigh of relief once he was out of earshot. He waited a few seconds before inching towards the other side of the pillar, keeping to the walls in case the scientists decided to turn around. 

“1527, 1527, 1527,” Yixing repeated to himself as he continued his search, whispering a ‘bingo!’ to himself when he finally located the room he’d been looking for. A console sat on the wall beside the door, its specifications exactly as their analysis team had determined. Yixing pulled out his pocket knife and pried open the console carefully with the blade, letting the monitor hang from its cables. He reached for the green-white and orange wires and, hesitating only a second so that he could start the timer on his watch, he drew the blade across the two wires. “Five minutes starts now,” he said into his wrist as he began to strip the wires of their rubber coating. 

“Got it,” Kris confirmed, “I’ve got about another couple gigs of data to transfer and I’ll be on my way to the rendez-vous point.”

Yixing didn’t bother to reply as he focused on his task, holding the knife between his teeth as he reached into his pocket for his phone and attached a crossover cable into the data port, connected to four alligator clips on the other end. Yixing clipped into the ends of the cut wires and started the descrambler program Jongdae had written into his phone. 

“C’mon, c’mon, c’mon,” Yixing whispered to himself as he checked his watch impatiently. As soon as the panel flashed green to grant Yixing access into the lab, he pulled his phone free from the cable and shoved it into his pocket as he pushed the door open. He left the alligator clips where they were though; the guards responding to the silent alarm that had been triggered when Yixing cut those wires already knew there was a security breach and dangling wires off a hanging control panel. He checked his watch for the sixth time as he ran towards the center of the lab where the device he was searching for was supposed to be. Instead, the workstation was empty. Yixing cursed, hurrying to rummage through the rest of the lab as quickly as he could, hoping that he’d simply checked the wrong area. His search came up empty. 

“Qinglong?” Yixng called into his comm device, “We got a problem. The device isn’t here.”

There was a long pause on the line before Kris replied, “What do you mean?”

Yixing rolled his eyes and checked his watch yet again: 01:37. “ _ I mean _ , I searched the whole lab and the thing isn’t here. It doesn’t look like Chan got here before us though, no signs of forced entry. Are you still in the server room? Can you check if they moved the device somewhere else?”

“Already on it,” Kris chirped, “Yeah, apparently they needed to run some different tests, they moved it two rooms down from where you are.”

“Copy, on my way,” Yixing said as he made his way to the exit, though he wondered if he would still make it within their five minute window; his phone kept the encryption key for the doors but getting the wires stripped in time would be his limiting factor. He threw the door open and immediately reached for the alligator clips still hanging off the panel. When he looked up to search for the room Kris mentioned, he found himself no longer alone in the hallway. Heart rate climbing quickly, his hand immediately went for the gun in his holster, only to hesitate briefly when he recognized the face; Huang Zitao had just charged out of the room Kris had mentioned, the device Yixing was looking for in his enemy’s hand. “You have got to be fucking kidding me,” he muttered to himself, fingers closing around the handle and bringing his pistol up, aiming it down the hallway at Zitao, who had already taken off in the opposite direction, tucking the device into his shoulder bag as he ran.

“We’ve got company, Qinglong!” he called into his wrist, immediately giving chase.

There was a loud grunt in his ear, “Yeah! I figured as much!” Kris confirmed flippantly, alongside the sound of body parts colliding. “Got a little company of my own here.”

“Shit!” Yixing cursed as he followed Zitao through a doorway to a different stairwell. He hissed when a cursory scan down then up revealed that the man was going  _ up _ . “ _ Why do they always go  _ up?!” he spat out, annoyed. 

Yixing felt the adrenaline coursing through his veins as he took the steps two at a time towards the building rooftop. He stole a quick glance as he passed yet another door, this one with two giant ‘2’s painted on its center. ‘Just twelve more floors,’ Yixing thought to himself as he continued upwards, even as a loud ‘bang’ below him indicated that the building security had discovered Yixing’s trajectory.

He could hear Tao’s footsteps echoing in the stairwell alongside his own, a steady pounding only a couple floors above him. He steadied his breathing, focusing on keeping his pace even and not burning up his energy too soon. 

As the stairwell above him began to shrink (‘About fucking time,’ he thought to himself), Yixing picked his pace up, breath coming out short as he started to take the steps three at a time. 

The sound of a door being thrown open above him echoed through the stairwell and Yixing pushed himself to go faster, reaching the door as it began to slam shut. It took him half a second to gather his bearings, to note that Zitao was standing in the center of the helipad, staring up and then checking his watch. The sound of the door closing behind Yixing was enough to alert Zitao and he spun towards his pursuer. 

Zitao’s expression was hardly surprised; Yixing  _ had _ been chasing him up over twenty flights of stairs. Instead, he put on a glib smile and raised his hands to either side of his head. “Ah, you got me, Agent Zhang,” he called out, taking a step backwards. 

Yixing brought his gun up again, pointing it at Zitao’s chest and clicking the safety off at the same time. “Don’t move,” he ordered, steadying his stance as he eyed the rest of the rooftop, noting down every location Zitao might run and hide behind. The only exit was the door he had just stepped out of and with it being barely a couple steps behind him, there was no way Zitao was getting to it before Yixing could stop him. 

“Aww, come on, let’s talk! I haven’t seen you in ages, let’s catch up. How have you been, Agent Zhang?”

Yixing scowled at the fake friendly tone but took a careful step forwards, “I said,  _ stop, _ ” he ordered again, his voice stern as he watched Zitao retreat closer to the edge

“I have been fantastic, thank you for asking,” Zitao carried on his one-sided conversation, still taking deliberate steps backwards until he was up against the concrete half-wall keeping him from falling off the roof.

Yixing’s grip around his sidearm tightened when Zitao started to pace slowly in front of the ledge. He pulled the safety back, its click loud enough to make Zitao raise an eyebrow and pause to turn and face Yixing properly. “Is that any way to treat an old friend?” he asked, amusement clear in his grin even as he tilted his head to the side, “Besides, that’s not how you guys do things. I’m unarmed, see?” He waved his hands above his head dramatically as if Yixing needed the reminder; he was already having a hard time not pulling the trigger as it was.

“Goddammit, Huang Zitao, is this all some game to you?” Yixing hissed, fingers flexing around the gun as he narrowed his eyes, “What the hell is it that you want?”

“ _ I _ , don’t want anything,” Zitao returned, shifting backwards, precariously close to the edge now. 

“Then your _ employer _ then. What do they want with this device? And how the  _ hell _ do they keep getting the jump on us?”

Zitao smiled a last time before he spread his arms straight out on either side of him,  and took a deep bow. “Two Moons appreciates your cooperation.” 

“What?” Yixing managed to get out before he watched, as if in slow motion, his enemy grab something quickly off the concrete railing and attaching it to himself before he fell backwards. Yixing’s weapon was back up in a split second, and he aimed it at Zitao’s shoulder, pushing the latter off balance as he fell over when the bullet connected. A satisfying pained look pulled onto Zitao’s face as he disappeared over the edge, his shoulder bag falling to the roof with its strap severed. 

Yixing ran towards the edge as fast as he legs would take him, stopping only when the concrete wall edge slammed into his stomach painfully. He narrowed his eyes as he searched the side of the building for Zitao before he found a silhouette getting ever smaller. He took a step back and studied the wall, cursing out loud when he found the anchor to Zitao’s line. He took several more steps backwards before he aimed his gun, wincing when there was a bright spark as the bullet snapped off the metal cable.

When he returned to the wall to look down, all he could see was Zitao’s figure retreating with a limp into a van that had pulled up alongside the building. 

Yixing couldn’t help the smile that spread across his face when he realised he’d injured the enemy twice  _ and  _ stolen their bounty. 

“What’s your status, Qinglong?” Yixing asked, leaning over to pick up the dropped bag. He reached into his pocket and pulled out his wallet, flipping through its contents before finding the business card he was looking for. 

“Yeah, I’m all good. Meet you at the rendez-vous in fifteen? I’ve got a gift with me. A little unconscious, though.”

“‘A little’?” Yixing repeated, “Actually, nevermind that. We need to go to Plan B for extraction,” he replied, tossing both his wallet and  his gun over the cement wall. He walked back towards the entrance, positioning  himself in the middle of the helipad. 

“Copy, I’ll let the director know.”

“Good,” Yixing said, taking a deep breath just as the roof door flew open and several guards hurried through, all pointing their weapons at him. 

“Hands where I can see ‘em!” the first guard shouted, indicating for his subordinated to surround Yixing who made a dramatic point of checking his watch.

“Seven minutes and fifty-seven seconds. Wow. Is that really the best you can do?” Yixing asked, a haughty grin on his face.

“Identify yourself!”

“Lee Xiang He,” Yixing introduced easily, holding out the business card between two fingers, “Private contractor hired by your bosses to test your response time and I must say, I’m kinda disappointed and I’m sure your boss will be too, when he gets my report.”

“Excuse me?” the head guard said, narrowing his eyes skeptically, but inching forwards slowly to take the card. 

Yixing smiled, crossing his arms, “Need to make some calls to confirm my identity?” he prompted easily, holding his arms up on either side of his head, “Might as well search me while you figure that out too.”

The guard eyed the business card and Yixing cautiously, but he lowered his weapon slowly and called into his radio for whoever was on the other end to do a check.

“Right,” Yixing prompted when one of the other guards was done frisking him, “Shall we head inside then? It’s a bit chilly up here.”

 


	4. Names and Faces

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ExODU5 finally earns a win with the capture of one of the enemy's. But he's not a talker and it's Yixing's job to change that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm going to be pretty busy for the next couple of days but I still wanted to get a chapter up on time. Might have some typos, I'm really sorry!

By the time Yixing was released with his credentials in check, the medical conference’s opening speech had yet to start had been over for an hour, though several of its audience members remained in the front hall, whispering in small groups. Escorted by two guards behind him, he cleared his throat and pulled his button down straight as he cut down _The Diamond Group’_ s front foyer with an air of Someone Important. Several heads turned to watch Yixing leave and he couldn’t keep the smirk from spreading across his face when he heard a particularly excited group wonder quite loudly about whether Yixing was ‘some big shot CEO’ here to discuss business.

Yixing nodded at the two guards who held the building’s front door open for him; when the head guard had made the call to his manager, the latter had confirmed Yixing’s identity but (much to Yixing’s surprise), the head guard was still reasonably skeptical. It wasn’t until they had put Yixing through a thorough interrogation and the latter had, ‘as a symbol of good faith’, returned the stolen device, that the security team truly trusted his motives. ‘Smart,’ Yixing had thought to himself, ‘Just not smart enough.’

A black Town Car pulled up to the curb as Yixing descended the front steps to the building and the driver (Yixing recognized her as a fellow field agents not typically on his team) stepped out to open the door for Yixing to maintain the latter’s alias until the guards finally turned their backs.

“Did Kris make it back yet?” Yixing asked as soon as the car rounded the corner and the _Diamond_ building was shrinking behind them.

Sooyoung nodded her head, taking off her chauffeur uniform hat to properly meet Yixing’s eye in her rear-view mirror, “He’s back at HQ, looking after processing the new prisoner.”

“Has facial recognition come up with anything yet?”

“We’re working on a full profile. Last update was just a name: Kim Minseok. Don’t know yet if that’s real or just an alias.”

Yixing hummed in reply, checking his watch when Sooyoung stopped at a red light. He was eager to take a long shower and get out of these clothes; it’d been a long night to say the least.

***

It was couple days before the Director called a meeting to discuss their next steps. Amber was visibly irritated, and the dark shadows under her eyes gave away just how little she had slept the last few days. Rubbing the bridge of her nose between finger and thumb of one hand, she took her seat at the head of the conference room table. She dropped her tablet to the table with a rough clatter, sighing loudly before she spoke, “Alright, we all know why we’re here.” She brought up a picture of Huang Zitao sneaking inside a door at _The Diamond Group_ taken from the building’s security footage. She glanced over at Yixing meaningfully, reminding him silently about his failure on his previous mission.

Yixing’s teeth ground together as he replayed the encounter on the roof in his head for the twentieth time. The cocky smile smeared across his smug features as Huang Zitao fell backwards off the ledge. “Two Moons,” he answered through his teeth.

Amber sighed, “Yes, the group that keeps besting us at every turn finally has a name,” she announced, exhausted indignation clear in her words. She turned to her left and gestured towards the man seated next to her before settling into the back of her chair. “Sehun?”

A rather tall man that Yixing hadn’t noticed until Amber pointed him out got to his feet and cleared his throat. He straightened the tie under his sweater vest unnecessarily and picked up his tablet. “Right, so, uhm, Agent Zhang, when you turned in your report, you mentioned that Huang had said ‘Two Moons thanks you for your cooperation. So, naturally, we ran that term - that’s to say ‘two moons’ - through our database and, well, the name itself didn’t turn up anything,” he paused dramatically as if waiting for some kind of reaction before continued. When none of the agents in the room offered any observations, he cleared his throat and pressed on. “However, semiotics _does_ give us this,” he started to explain, taking control of the displays in the room and putting up an image that resembled the outline of two crescent moons stamped on top of each other in the grey stone. “The term ‘two moons’ isn’t explicitly used with respect to this symbol but the archaeological site where this was discovered also uncovered a relatively undamaged wall with a story about a god - or god-like human - that could move mountains with his mind. Which, of course, we all know is crazy. Carbon dating on the remains of that site places the symbols carved right around the time of some serious historical tectonic plate movement, and,”

Amber cleared her throat loudly from her seat, signally for Sehun to return to the topic at hand.

“Anyway,” Sehun continued, “We sent this symbol through our databases to see if anything popped up, and, after pooling _all_ the data from the twelve ExOD units _worldwide_ , this is what we got.” He tapped on his tablet and another image replaced the symbol on the displays.

It was a profile picture of a smiling man (most likely in his last twenties, Yixing guessed) in a crisp suit. It was an unremarkable picture, nothing in particular to note besides the well-groomed eyebrows.

“Aaaand, why do we care about pretty boy?” Kris piped up next to Yixing sarcastically.

Sehun shot Kris a quick glare but answered, “He name is Lu Han, or so it says on the ‘About’ page of ‘That Good Good Company’ of which he is the CEO.”

“I’m sorry, what did you say the name of the company was? ‘ _That Good Good’?_ ” Yixing asked incredulously, bringing out chuckled from around the room.

“Lu Han explains in an early interview that he’d intended to use the name ‘ _That Good Food Company_ ’ but there had been a problem at the trademarking office and it got changed to _‘That Good Good Company.’_ He didn’t realize it for a long time and when he did, he couldn’t be bothered to change it.”

“Enough about the terrible naming, can we get back to it?” Amber asked tersely, clearly in no mood to be making jokes about unfortunate naming of companies.

Sehun apologized quickly and continued his presentation, “At a cursory glance, he’s actually pretty boring. His company turns a pretty penny in profits but he’s clean as a whistle, no employee complaints or even a parking ticket. But everyone has secrets and when we dug a little deeper, we found out that two years ago, he was blackmailed. The police got involved and they confiscated a video that proved the Lu Han was having an affair with the wife of a major client.” The image on the displays turned into a blurry video of a naked Lu Han walking around what appeared to be a hotel room, taken by a camera most likely from across the street from the room window.

Beside him, Yixing heard Kris shift in his seat, clearing his throat uncomfortably. When the former turned, he found Kris’ ears a flaming red, obvious even in the dim lighting of the conference room. Yixing grinned at the discover of Kris’ conservative reaction. When the latter caught Yixing watching him, he cleared his throat and frowned, shifting in his seat again and avoid Yixing’s eye.

Back at the head of the room, Sehun had paused the video with Lu Han turned sideways. He proceeded to zoom in on Lu Han’s left leg with a pixelated copy of the symbol of interest was printed halfway up the thigh.

“Is that…” Yixing started to ask, leaning forwards in his chair and squinting to get a better look at the tattoo that wrapped around the side of Lu Han’s leg.

“Is it,” Sehun confirmed giddily, “But that’s not even the interesting part.” He began tapping on his tablet again. “In this age of constant surveillance no matter where you go, you’d think that the CEO of a big company would be fairly visible. At a charity event, or at a high security client, or just, well _anywhere,_ actually. The funny thing is, even with all the events he’s been a confirmed guest at, the only photographic proof we found of him were always partial,” he explained, clicking through several images where only parts of his face could be identified, slipping in and out of security camera angles. “It’s as though he actively avoids being captured on screen. And oddly enough, the government doesn’t even have a record of his _passport_. There’s no record of a date of birth, no country of origin, no immigration papers, no family to note of. Besides his last five years as CEO, there’s _nothing_ on this man on any computer _anywhere._ ”

“So are you saying we have _nothing_?” Yixing asked, doubtful that Amber would have brought him in just to reveal they didn’t have actionable information.

“No, we have this,” Sehun answered simply, putting up four pictures on screen, one of the video they’d just seen, one black and white photograph that looked like it’d been taken when photography was first invented, one picture of a painting from the late Imperial China, and finally, an intricate carving in ceramic tile, each showcasing the same face on different mediums.

“You’re not trying to say that all these pictures are of the same person, are you?” Kris asked, his tone full of disbelief, eyes glued to the monitor closest to him.

Sehun made a gesture somewhere between a shrug and a grimace, “It… certainly seems that way. Or at the very least, they all look the same, for some reason we have yet to discover.”

“Either way,” Amber finally piped up to address the entirety of the room, “Two moons and finding out what their goals are has become a priority. And step one of that is going to be figuring out what exactly this device is and why they wanted it.” She turned to Sehun again, “It is paramount that we find out what those documents say before they do.” She moved to get out of her seat, reaching for her tablet, “Thanks to Agent Wu, we have ourselves someone of theirs, so let’s make the most of it.” She turned to Yixing, “I’m tasking you with the interrogation of Kim Minseok,” she concluded in a dismissive tone before standing up properly. “Get what you can from him, I’m tired of being in the dark.” She grabbed her tablet and left quickly. Sehun stood frozen on the spot, clearly unfamiliar with Amber’s brusque manner, and it took him a long moment before he followed her lead and left the conference room alongside the rest of the agents.

Yixing waited for the room to clear out before he too got to his feet, making his way to the elevator where Kris was already waiting, the down button already lit. Kris, despite being the one to bring in the prisoner, had been denied access given his new status, and his eagerness to assess his catch was obvious. “Mind if I join you?” he asked, the politest Yixing had ever encountered from him. Yixing raised an eyebrow skeptically before rolling his eyes and looking down at his tablet, pulling up Kim Minseok’s file to review.

“Actually, yes, I do mind. It’s going to be hard enough to get a read on this guy, I don’t need some uncontrollable idiot making things worse.” The elevator doors opened and he stepped into it, with Kris close on his heels. “Stubborn, aren’t you,” he muttered under his breath as he hit the button for ‘B3’ and watched the metallic doors close.

Kris didn’t answer, standing quietly in the opposite corner of the car. Sighing with resignation, Yixing dropped the arm that was holding his tablet to his side. “Fine, you can’t come in, but you can watch from the viewing room next door.”

Kris grumbled indecipherably as the doors slid open (though Yixing thought he caught something along the lines of ‘being kept out of all the fun’). He did as he was told though, stepping into the room ahead of Yixing’s destination without another argument.

Yixing showed his ID to the guard seated outside the next door and took a deep breath before going inside.

Kim Minseok had said exactly zero words since his arrival. Kris had brought him in (unconscious and handcuffed) and had the privilege of personally throwing him into his new home, an eight-by-eight cell with three walls of concrete and a fourth wall of soundproof glass that could be made opaque at the touch of a button.

When the prisoner had finally come to, the standard debrief team had taken an unsuccessful swing at getting into Kim’s head and the only information they had on him was from a database search: he was a private contractor with priors in illegal firearm possession alongside several warrants for explosive plastics distribution. He’d dropped off the government’s radar in the last few years though, and Yixing could only assume it was due to his new job with the annoyingly secretive ‘Two Moons’.

Amber had assigned Yixing to try again because he had a knack of getting into a person’s head. Yixing would describe his interrogation styles as non-physical. Given the opportunity, he always preferred having a conversation rather than resorting to his hands. It was clearly the opposite of what the previous person in his position had done given the bloodied look on Kim Minseok as Yixing watched him from the screen on the control panel beside the glass. The prisoner was lying still on his bed (with only a steel frame for a mattress) in the center of the room, staring at the ceiling. His left eye was swollen, there was a cut that span from his lip down to his chin, and his prisoner fatigues were soiled with patches of drying crimson.

Yixing picked up the chair that was folded against the wall beside the door and opened it in the center of the room, positioning it in front of the frost window before heading back to the control panel. With several quick taps on the touch screen, he made the glass transparent and allowed two-way conversation with a quiet buzz that was just loud enough to make Kim sit up and turn around to look at his newest visitor.

Yixing didn’t introduce himself as he took a seat in the chair, proceeding immediately to engage in a staring contest with the prisoner, who have gotten to his feet to limp towards the glass wall to get a better look at Yixing. He pressed his arm against the glass, leaning into it as he stared back at Yixing through his one good eye. It was a good ten minutes before Kim chuckled and hobbled back to the only furnishing in the room to lie down again.

Yixing maintained his position for the better part of an hour, moving only once to get up and start the coffee machine in the corner of his side of the room. It was minute 53 before either spoke up.

“You’re not going to get anything from me,” Kim finally said, still lying on the steel bed frame.

“Oh?” was Yixing’s simple answer, taking a sip from his now Luke-warm coffee.

“You think you can just wait me out. You an amateur?”

“Got nineteen more words out of you than the last amateur that tried,” Yixing remarked.

Minseok laughed as he got up to a seated position and spun around in his bed to face Yixing through the glass, “Well, congratulations then.”

Yixing smiled, uncrossing his legs to re-cross them the other way, “Why, thank you.” He put his cup down on the floor beside his chair, contributing nothing further.

“You a shrink? Did they send you down here to psychoanalyze me?”

“‘Down’?” Yixing repeated, raising an eyebrow slowly into his forehead, “You were unconscious when you were brought in. How do you know we’re not fifty floors up?”

Kim frowned, “I was starting to like you, so please don’t insult me.”

Yixing chortled, “What makes you think I’m a psychiatrist?”

Kim shrugged, “You sitting there all quiet and waiting for me to start the conversation reminds me of my childhood therapist.”

“Childhood therapist?” Yixing asked. There had been no mention of a therapist in his file and he doubted that if Kim ever had one as a child, he’d be so easily talking about it. It was obvious that Kim was just trying to distract with words and Yixing decided to play along, for the time being at least. “You trying to make yourself relatable?”

“That depends, is it working?”

“What do you think?”

Kim shrugged again, getting to his feet and starting to pace in a circle around the edges of the cell. “So, you’re the one who took on Tao?” he asked, looking Yixing up and down in an appraisal. “That’s quite an impressive feat to have gotten away with barely a scratch. I’m impressed.”

“‘Tao’? You two are close then?” Yixing prodded.

Kim paused in his pacing to face his interrogator, “That wasn’t a slip, in case you were wondering. We’ve been working together long enough to be comfortable using nicknames. It’s not some secret. His for me, in case you were wondering, is Xiumin. Don’t ask me what it means, I have no idea what goes through that kid’s head.”

“How long is long?”

Kim grinned and continued limping around the cell, “Wouldn’t you like to know.”

“That’s why I asked.”

“Maybe if we continued this conversation over a steak dinner, I’d be more talkative. Paired with a Chateau Lafite? 1865 preferably.”

Yixing hid his sigh behind a smile, noting that Kim was now just making a mockery of the entire situation; he knew there was no way the man would break so easily over an expensive dinner. Instead, he drew his wrist up and checked the time dramatically. “That sounds perfect actually, just in time for lunch,” he said, even though his watch was reading well before noon; adding time disorientation was a plus.

Only the raise of a single eyebrow gave away Kim’s surprise at the abrupt end of their conversation. Neither party said anything as Yixing folded his chair back into place on the wall beside the entrance. He doubled back to pick up his coffee cup on his way to turn off the brewer on the opposite wall.

“This was nice,” Kim offered as Yixing looked down to his tablet to make the glass opaque again. “I look forward to our next ses-” he added, his voice cut off when Yixing tapped his tablet.

Yixing sighed, rubbing the bridge of his nose with fore finger and thumb.

“Well, that was unproductive,” Kris’ voice rang into the room, making Yixing look up abruptly in surprise to find the latter sticking his upper body through the door’s half open entrance.

Yixing scowled, “I thought I told you to stay in the viewing room,” he hissed, pulling the door open fully so that he could exit around Kris. “Besides, it’s going to take some time. Kim Minseok is clearly a man who thinks he’s smarter than all of us, that he can out think us. Violence isn’t going to work with him so we’re just going to have to wear him down over time. Not everything gets solved with fists.”

“I beg to differ. Your way isn’t going to get us what we need in time,” Kris argued, “The director said that this was a priority and you just spent over an hour getting _absolutely nothing_.”

“Tch, that’s because you’re not looking hard enough, you’re all about the short game, when this is clearly a _long_ game for them. We know that his relationship with Huang Zitao is good and he feels like a big brother to him. He’s arrogant and thinks that most people are below him, so he’s not going to talk to someone he doesn’t think is his equal.”

“You’re saying he thinks _you’re_ his equal?” Kris asked incredulously.

“Not necessarily, but he clearly thinks Zitao is, and given that I could hold my own against him, he hasn’t immediately dismissed the possibility,” Yixing explained as they duo headed back upstairs. He reached into his pocket to check his phone, sure that there were several messages he’d missed during his session with Kim.

Kris groaned, “There’s just something off about him, he doesn’t seem like he’s in any rush to go anywhere.”

Yixing rolled his eyes as he scrolled through his phone notifications, “Uh, he’s in an eight-by-eight cell, he’s _not_ going anywhere.”

Kris shot Yixing a glare as they stepped onto the office floor, “Think about it, Yixing, if you were in his place, would you just be hanging about, just waiting to be interrogated? No, you’d be looking for a way out, for the first opportunity to break out.”

Yixing hesitated a moment as he read an incoming message, “Looks like ballistics is done with those bullets they found in the guards,” he said, ignoring Kris’ paranoia.

“We already know it was Kim Minseok who killed those guards, what else do you need to know?” Kris muttered, nearly running into Yixing when the latter had stopped to send a message to the ballistics department that he’d be right over.

Yixing rolled his eyes again, “If we can find out where they get their guns, we might be able to get a lead on this ‘Two Moons’ group and find out what we’re actually dealing with.” He turned on his heel and headed towards the elevator again, “You coming? Or are you just going to hang about _whining_?”

Kris narrowed his eyes but held his tongue, stepping into the elevator when it opened and let it take them a floor down where Tiffany was already waiting for them, eyes eager as she greeted them and lead them to her lab, monitors lined up with streams of data on their screens, a digital 3D drawing of the bullet in question spinning on the display. Yixing's eyes flickered between Tiffany and the monitors, rolling his eyes when she looked back at him expectantly. Yixing rolled his eyes, opening his mouth to explain that he had no idea what he was supposed to be looking at, only to be interrupted by Kris, who had tensed up beside him.

“I know those markings,” Yixing heard Kris bite out beside him but before he could ask for more information, the taller male had disappeared from his side. Yixing spun around, alarmed when he found Kris hurrying out the door with hard determination written across all his features. Yixing looked back at the screen for a moment and then to Kris’ retreating figure again “Shit,” he muttered to himself as he started to move his feet after Kris. “Be right back, gotta deal with this first,” Yixing called behind him to the confused analyst and he began running towards the stairwell crashing through it and taking the steps down to ‘B3’ two at a time. “Goddammit, Kris!” he yelled into the empty stairwell, doubtful that it would slow the taller’s descent towards the prisoner block. He cursed out loud again when he heard the door to ‘B3’ slam shut several floors below him, annoyed that’s Kris’ naturally longer legs made him that much faster.

By the time Yixing had reassured the guard that he would handle whatever situation had gone down inside Kim Minseok’s cell, Kris had gotten past the security panel that lifted the glass wall and had its resident pinned against the wall. The taller’s fist was raised at his ear, ready to strike, and not for the first time from the way the prisoner was bleeding from his forehead and nose.

Yixing ground his teeth in frustration as he took in the scene before him, stomping forwards to peel Kris off the prisoner and thrust him quickly backwards out of the prisoner cell. Kim slid down the wall, seemingly unaffected by the ordeal, given the giant smirk he was wearing.

With one arm at full strength just to keep Kris from flying at Kim again, Yixing used the other hand to punch in his code into the security panel to lockdown the door to anyone with security clearance lower than his own. As loud _clunk_ sounded as the wall slid back into place and a series of locking mechanisms actuated just as Kris’ rage overpowered Yixing and he ran head first into the glass with a resounding _thunk_.  

Kris reached for the access panel and frantically put in the code that had allowed him access second ago only to be rejected now. He slammed his hand loudly against the wall before turning to glare at Yixing. “Let me back inside,” he hissed, eyes dangerously dark.

Yixing stared back at Kris sternly, “That’s two strikes, Wu,” he warned, bringing his arms up to cross on his chest. “A third and I don’t care what deal you have with Director Liu, you are off the team.”

Kris took a step forward and straightened his back as he stared down at his superior defiantly, clearly hoping that his towering height might intimidate the smaller man, “Let. Me. In.”

Yixing sighed, raising an eyebrow in disbelief as if to say ‘ _Seriously?’_ , not bothering to even dignify Kris’ insubordinate behaviour with a verbal response. He rolled his eyes when Kris glared a second longer before turning back to the access panel and aggressively pounding the keypad as if he might get lucky and guess correctly in some miracle.

An annoying horn sounded every time Kris failed and Yixing rolled his eyes with exasperation, turning his attention to the secure prisoner who had finally got up to his feet. Kim Minseok pressed a thumb to the edge of his lip to wipe at the crimson streak there, pulling his hand away to assess the damage with an amused expression.

Kris glanced up momentarily to glare at Kim through the glass before he resumed his relentless assault on the keypad, slamming a fist against the brick wall when an automated voice said “Incorrect code: access denied,” for the seventh time. “Too many failed attempts, initiating lockdown,” it continued.

At the sound of a set of secondary tumblers sliding into place with a succession of loud thumps, Kim Minseok’s mouth stretch to laugh mutedly - the microphones were still disabled and the image of burst into raucous laughter that sent more red burning into Kris’ face.

“You know you’re just letting him win, right?” Yixing finally piped up, stepping up to the access panel and hitting a single button that muted the blaring alarm.  Yixing sighed heavily when Kris proceeded to reach for his gun, aiming it at the control panel. “It’ll fail shut, idiot,” Yixing assured, trying to stay calm as he waited for the taller to get his tantrum over with.

Kris scowled and proceeded to click the safety off and aim it next at the glass wall, immediately opening fire and emptying the entire clip. When the only damage he caused were several tiny spider webbed dents in the glass, he threw his gun with a loud roar. He turned abruptly to grab Yixing around the collar and pushed him back towards the security panel, “Open the damn door, Zhang Yixing. He’s _mine,_ ” he hissed, eyes bloodshot and wide as he stared Yixing down.

Yixing’s jaw clenched as he glared back up at Kris, deciding that he was done being patient. His eyebrow twitched up as he tried to contain his own bubbling rage at yet _another_ unprofessional act from this new hire he didn’t want in the first place. He’d already warned Kris once and the taller was seriously testing his patience. He reached one hand up to grab Kris’ wrist, skillfully maneuvering around so that the taller was forced to loosen his grip. Yixing reversed their positions, taking advantage of Kris’ blinding rage to pin the taller against the wall, arm twisted behind his back.  “You quite done yet?”

Kris grunted, pushing back against Yixing and forcing the latter to press one forearm against Kris’ back to hold him in place and use the other arm to pull Kris’ arm back at an unnatural angle. “Are. You. Done.”

Kris didn’t answer, still squirming until Yixing applied even more pressure on the arm. He grimaced and then stopped fighting back, nodding as best as he could with his face pressed up against the wall.

Yixing made a point to hold the position a moment longer before he finally let go, holding his gaze hard when Kris turned around to face him properly a short moment before he ducked his head in acknowledgement of his loss. He rolled his strained shoulder a couple times, leaning over to pick up his discarded weapon and Yixing could see him give the prisoner a last glare as if to say ‘ _this isn’t over’_ before turning to storm out of the room altogether.

Yixing sighed as he reset the cylinders and took the panel out of lockdown. When he looked up, Kim had his arms crossed on his chest, smiling widely. Yixing’s teeth ground together; Kris wasn’t at the top of his list of favourites at the moment, but he was still way above Kim Minseok. “Don’t look so smug,” he spat, turning on the microphones only long enough to get in what he had to say, “Next time I might just let him get his vengeance,” he warned, cutting off the mics once more and turning the glass opaque to leave the prisoner to himself once more.

Kris was pacing the width of the hallway in front of the elevators when Yixing finally caught up to him. Yixing didn’t say anyway, only standing with his arms crossed impatiently as he waited for Kris to speak first.

“It was _him_ , that piece of shit killed my partner,” Kris finally blurted, arms flailing madly as he spoke. “You should’ve let me kill the son of a bitch,” he hissed, still pacing.

“I figured as much when you stormed out of ballistics without another word,” Yixing replied coolly. He disagreed with Amber’s decision to let a man hellbent on revenge on the project, given how there was an explicit clause about personal conflicts of interest in the ExODU5’s policies, but all Yixing could do was _deal with the problem._ With an exasperated sigh, Yixing uncrossed his arms and walked past Kris into the elevator that arrived with a quiet bell. “Come on,” he gestured with his head, “Why don’t we work off all that energy?” he suggested, trying to keep his tone light as he hit the button for the ExODU5 gym instead of returning to the ballistics department.

“What?” Kris said blankly as he stood frozen in place, finally done pacing. It wasn’t until the doors started to slide closed before he reacted and stepped inside.

Yixing rolled his eyes, not bothering to explain as the elevator ascended several floors and opened to their destination. Wordlessly, he made his way to the mats, “Suit up,” he said simply before discarding his sweater to a nearby bench and stretching his arm across his chest.

“What?” Kris repeated like a broken record, staring at Yixing blankly.

Yixing rolled his eyes and continued to stretch, kicking his shoes off, “You’ve too distracted to be of any use elsewhere, and I’ve yet to fully gauge your combat ability. Two birds, one stone,” he explained simply.

Kris sighed and crossed his arms, “I’m not in the mood to spar,” he replied begrudgingly, starting to turn away.

“It wasn’t a suggestion,” Yixing returned with a hard tone, arm shooting out with a closed fist, barely grazing the nose as the taller dodged the attack. Yixing smiled as he threw a follow-up left hook that Kris easily stepped out of. Yixing, expecting the punch to fail, used the momentum and spun on his leading heel to bring up his rear leg to connect against the arm that Kris had brought up defensively to protect his head.

“You’re a real pain in my ass, Zhang Yixing,” Kris growled, pushing his arm out to force Yixing’s leg down.

Yixing snorted, “Right back at you, Kris. Now you know what’s it’s like having to dealing with _you_.”

Kris stared at Yixing blankly for a moment before he scowled and started to turn again, giving Yixing an easy opening to sweep the taller’s legs out from under him. “You’re going to have to do better than that,” he snorted, getting back to his feet and hopping in place a couple times to loosen his muscles.

Kris hit the floor hard, and he groaned loudly through tightly closed eyes and a clenched jaw. Yixing could see him mouth a couple of swears to himself, shaking his head before he glared up at Yixing. “Fine, have it your way,” he spat, rolling onto his front and pulling himself up to his feet. “You asked for it,” he taunted, pulling his jacket off and throwing it onto the floor angrily. He flexed his knuckles, his eyes narrowing. “Don’t go regretting this later.”

Yixing snorted, raising his forefinger to beckon Kris closer tauntingly. “I’d like to see you try.”

 

 


	7. [Announcement of Termination]

I regret to announce the permanent suspension of this work. The story has been sitting in the back of my mind for three months now and I just can’t seem to find the energy to keep writing this. I apologize to the few who were actually reading this but I no longer have the time to invest in a story that simply doesn’t have the viewership to motivate me to keep going. I would still like to take the time to say thank you to everyone who HAS been reading and leaving comments, they kept me going for awhile. This started as a fill for my own need for a non-mainstream fic that wasn’t just all fluff and no substance. I love action and sci-fi and thought this would be a great opportunity to challenge myself as my ability in both these areas are… minimal (to be nice about it xD). Anyway, before I go on a rant about writer problems, I’ll say thanks again for those of you who made it this far and sorry if you expected more. I may contemplate dumping what I already have drafted up for this story (I had a rough plan of everything that goes down, as well as an ending lol) here like I did with all my other WIPs that I do not intend to finish if anyone cares enough (which I doubt haha).


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